It Might Get Messy

Among my parent’s friends when I was growing up was Mr. W and his family. I believe Mr. W might well have been Doctor W, I think he had a PhD. He was a devoted and innovative teacher. His kids all grew into successful intelligent professionals. Mr. W had one odd weakness. In a crowd of (very heavy) drinkers, his tolerance for alcohol was nearly nonexistent. At parties, he’d drink a beer, maybe two. Then he’d fall asleep on the couch. For the remainder of the party.


Ulysses S. Grant (whose birth name was Hiram Ulysses Grant) was not, despite popular belief and media portrayal, an alcoholic. He wasn’t even a heavy drinker. He shared with Mr. W (or perhaps it was vice versa), nearly nonexistent tolerance for alcohol. As he learned early in his life (essentially all of which was spent in the military), it took a tiny dose to elicit a major-ass response. After his time as a Quartermaster in the war with Mexico, he seldom drank. And never when it was important [1].


He sure as hell smoked though. Cigars, and lots of ‘em. Pretty much constantly. I’m sure he got through the hell of the Civil War at least partially because of the nicotine haze he lived in. 


And it cost him. He died of throat cancer, a few days after he delivered the manuscript of his memoirs to Mark Twain, his publisher. In 1885 there wasn’t much they could do for you if you had a tumor plumping up at the top of your trachea. But at least it pissed him off enough for him to keep himself alive long enough to finish his book.


I no longer have a tumor plumping up at my trachea. Or my tongue. I continue, however, to have a painful, rotting mandible. Actually, by keeping my mouth scrupulously clean, swishing things with my topical antibiotic, and not eating solid food (which tends to ball up in the injured area), the pain has been manageable. 


But it’s still there. It’s achieving a sort of chronic status, the kind of pain you live with because you just have to. 


I gotta get past it, though. My speech is improving, but my mouth has been too painful to do my tongue exercises and even my gape width calibrator. Plus, even though I’m getting all my calories (and keeping my weight up) by mouth and not by feeding tube, it’s all frickin’ liquid. Big-ass tumblers of Carnation Instant Breakfast with an extra scoop of Nestle Quick chocolate milk mix. 


It’s not bad. But it’s not food. I see my surgeon on the 21st. No idea if he can do anything for me. But I made a massive pan of risotto Milanese tonight, and couldn’t eat any of it. I’m really starting to get ticked off about this.


Not that it’s gonna help. Didn’t do much for Grant.


Notes


[1] A number of excellent biographies of Grant are available, and his own memoirs have a good rep. An up-to-date biography that concentrates less on the Civil War and more on his post-war career is U.S. Grant: American Hero, American Myth by Joan Waugh, University of North Carolina Press, 2009.