I am clean and scrubbed, ready for tomorrow’s surgery. This is an important milestone. It will be the first true assessment we have of the condition of my eye. All the information we have had so far is indirect, because blood is still obscuring any view of the retina. Tomorrow’s surgery will reattach the retina and also show us the road ahead for maximum recovery of my sight.

Because of damage to my facial nerve, I have the sensation of a large hole in my face, an absence in the whole that is my head. Sometimes that hole feels very cold and very black. I’ve been envisioning instead a space filled with a small gentle sun; a clear, peaceful, healing light.

Feeding this light is all the positive energy all of you are sending me. I cannot express how grateful I am for all the warm wishes I continue to receive from so many of you. It is so unexpected and such a blessing. Thank you.

Picture me looking back at you with both eyes and a big grin on my face.

I’ve taken to watching in a mirror the redressing of my eye. It makes me even more grateful for my caretakers, especially my partner. How brave she is to look at my wound again and again, to face down her fears to take such care of me. And the gravity of my trauma is finally sinking in: how lucky I am to have even survived such a blow, to still have an eyeball, to still have a recognizable face to look into. What good fortune is mine to have love, to have help and care, family and friends. And, by gum, to have insurance. And gifted surgeons.

May such good fortune bless all of you.