Buried Alive

BURIED ALIVE!
by Jude Lesemann

Where am I? What's happening? I'm in some type of a suspension, in a void of nothingness? No cool or warm. No light or dark. No sound. Wait! Yes. I hear a distant murmuring, the tone of a faraway sea, the rushing of white-capped, blue waves of an ebbing tide? I hear a peculiar, rhythmic mechanical beep, like a mournful foghorn that has lost its throaty moan. My entire physical body and all my senses, feel as if they have lapsed into a deep, rapturous sleep, my brain the only insomniac. I feel a comforting sense of peace tainted with a lingering fragment of fear. I have never known this subtle realm of self-awareness or is it un-awareness? I feel as if my entire being is uniquely a brain suspended in infinite time and space.

I must think! That particle of fear is fear of what? It's difficult to recall. Yes, I remember descending, spiraling, plummeting through deep blue space, an ear-shattering whine and gripping fear. Yes, terrible, choking fear. But, fear of what, the sudden plunge? Was I being pursued? How frustrating. My memory appears to be the deepest sleeper.

Wait! Listen! Voices! I can't make out what is being said or who is speaking. Speak up!

Where am I? Who are these murmuring people? I'm growing frustrated with this nebulous dream. It's time to wake up.

"Sarah."

Yes, that's me, Sarah.

"Sarah, it's me, Jim. If only I sensed if you could hear me. Sar, if only I knew."

Yes, Jimmy, I can hear you. I'm okay now. It's all right, honey, don't worry, it's going to be fine now. It's okay.

Wait a moment...I don't hear my voice. I don't feel my lips moving. I can't see him. What's going on? Something is very wrong!

Jim, help me. What's happening to me? Answer me Jim, please answer me.

"Sarah, you're in University Hospital. You're going to be okay. I know you are. Fight, baby, fight hard. They're wrong. You are going to make it Oh. Oh, my God, you have to make it, Sar."

Jim, please, baby, don't cry. I'm here. Of course I'm going to make it. Please, baby, don't cry.

They must have given me a dose of Demerol or some other narcotic for pain. That darn stuff always knocks me for a loop and gives me eerie hallucinations. I remember the weird dreams I had the last time they gave it to me.

I wonder where my pain is? Where do I hurt? I don't feel anything now. I don't even feel numb. This must be the way a preserved brain, nakedly suspended in a huge, lab bell jar of formaldehyde feels, at least emotionally. Am I floating in a jar on a shelf fully exposed to all who pass by?

I want this narcotic haze to wear off now! It does strange things to my mental perception. I need to concentrate on the consciousness and pull myself back. My mind wanders off...

"Sarah, honey, I have to go now. It's so difficult to leave you alone like this. The nurses only permit a five minute visit every hour, baby. I'll be back soon and I know you will be better. I love you, Sara. Fight, baby, fight? Don't give up. We'll make it, we'll make it!"

Jim, please, don't go, don't leave me alone. Hold on to me. Every time you fade out I feel like I drift further away into a strange, senseless void. JIMMY, DON'T LEAVE ME NOW, DON'T LEAVE ME EVER!

Tell me what's happening, talk to me, anybody, please. I'm in this lifeless body, but don't treat me like I am a mannequin, an inanimate object without feelings and comprehension.

DON'T TALK ABOUT ME, TALK WITH ME!

If only I could talk to Jim, communicate with him in some way. Think, try to think back to what caused this tragedy.

Hmmmm, yes, I remember something. I am floating through space. Free falling, unrestrained. No I am constrained in a seat. That keeps coming back. A plane falling ... Good God, yes... the plane ... I'm in a small plane. Someone is next to me. She's trying to fly the plane, trying to pull it out of a streaking, plummeting dive. Laurie! What happened to Laurie?

The screaming, sputtering engine is going into a stall and we start a dizzying, ear-splitting,spinning vertical dive. A terrifying nightmare as we tumble toward the earth below We instantly freeze like participants in a child's game of statue. The patchwork quilt of greens and browns beneath us rises quickly to swallow us. Then, CRASH! Darkness!

I don't remember any pain or a trip to hospital. I must have been in shock.

Thank God I am alive! Laurie, where is she? I'm so weary, I must rest...

VOICES! Unfamiliar voices, to which I cannot assign faces fade in and out, mostly indecipherable. Ah, I hear Jim's deep, resonant voice, now so unsure and wavering with emotion.

"Jim, I'm afraid there's nothing additional that we can do for Sarah at the moment. We can keep her alive, that's about all we can offer. There are still periodic, erratic brain waves, but not meaningful reactions to sensory stimulation. Medically, she is kept alive by the ventilator breathing for her, drugs stimulating her heart and other organs. She is essentially brain dead. You will have to now decide the course of action you want us to take in the next few days. Jim, I'm so sorry. We've done everything we know how to do at this point in time. The only thing we can do is to hope and pray. I'm sorry Jim. That's medically all we can offer you and Sarah."

You say, hope and pray... machines and tubes... periodic brain waves... medically and legally alive??

I AM CONSCIOUSLY ALIVE! Do something for me! I'm captured in this body that doesn't respond. My body is medically dead but my mind lives on, a prisoner held captive within. Not death, I want to live!

I want to go home to my rambling farmhouse in Vermont. I want to sit under the sugar maple tree and watch the hawks circle over head. I want to pick a fat, ruby red tomato from my vines, wipe the dirt off on my jeans and bite into the luscious flesh as the juice trickles down my chin. I want to feed my woolly sheep, Lamb Chop, saddle up my Morgan mare, Beauty, and go galloping like the wind down the dusty, ambling backcountry roads. I want to chase Jim through the back pasture and go skinny - dipping in the icy cold creek.

I WANT TO GET OUT OF HERE! I won't let them do this to me!

Think! If I can move something, to give them a sign,
If I raise an eyebrow, wiggle a finger, even utter a moan I know Jim will see it, will hear it. He'll take me to another hospital, to a renowned specialist who treats severe trauma cases like mine. I don't want to live the rest of my life in a dead body!

I've been buried alive! I can't think straight. I'm exhausted. I must sleep...

"Sarah, I love you so much, I can't stand seeing you like this. You're always so animated, so vital, a lively, happy person, never still a minute. Your face always has a warm glow of happiness and contentment. You are having a love affair with life. How we enjoy each other and our life together, never a dull moment and always filled with surprises. Even in our hardest times life is an exciting adventure.

"Sar, remember when you bought that horrid, garish painting from your art teacher. It's a masterpiece you declared defensively. You paid $200 for a canvas of paint tube leftovers. It's a real bargain, you insisted. Oh, what a row ensued. We were really fired up. Searing remarks filled the room. We smoldered for hours. Silence fanned the glowing embers and burst into flames at the slightest provocation. We finally burned ourselves out and found humor in the ashes. How ridiculous it was. The fire of passion raged hot that night as we made love time after time.


"How I love you, Sar, you're my whole life. You have brought me the first real happiness I've ever known. You taught me to love. You've shown me how to I live. I can't make it without you, Sar, I just can't make it. Why did this have to happen to you Sar."

Oh, Jim yes, it's not fair. I can't take this. Not being able to talk to you, communicate with you. I can't even touch you. This is worse than death, for in death there is a release.

Dear merciful God, heal me or take me now, get on with it, for in this state of consciousness there is nothing. There is no hope. Release me from this incarcerating suspension. I feel no closeness, no part of anyone or anything. I abide in an oppressive void. Don't keep me in suspension. Take out all these sustaining tubes. This is not life to me! Shut down all those whirring monsters.

PULL THE PLUGS! BE MERCIFUL, DEAR GOD! PULL ALL THE PLUGS!