Free Fallen: A Trauma, a Marriage, and the Transformative Power of Music by Kara Stanley

Stan, and I call him Beau or Baloo. He is the great love of my life.
    The most important thing to know about Simon is he is a musician. He has a Fine Arts degree from Concordia University, where he studied jazz guitar. His passion is roots-based music and he has two bands: Gut Bucket Thunder, which leans toward the rock side of roots, and the Precious Littles, which leans to the country. Si is a pivotal and much-loved figure in the Sunshine Coast music scene.
    For his birthday this year I gave him a trombone, an instrument he has never played. Initial attempts can best be described as melodic, rhythmic fart noises which cause spontaneous and uncontrollable laughter for me and Eli and acute distress for our dog, Paloma.
    Simon is very close to his parents, Marc and Lorna, who still live in the farmhouse he grew up in, in Quebec. Also, his sister, Emily, and her wife, Sarah, and their two kids, Oscar and Alice, who live in Toronto. Simon’s most enduring weekend routine is to rise a half-hour earlier than the rest of the house, drink endless cups of coffee, and chat with his parents or Emily.
    Eli, our son, is sixteen and an athlete, a soccer player. Saturday is soccer day, and every Saturday Si and I are on the sidelines (with more coffee) cheering him on.
    Si is an improviser; he has a sharp, quick wit and a mercurial mind able to string widely diverging bits of info magpie-like into a cohesive whole. A musical mind. A mathematical mind. He is a gifted talker: loud, gregarious, engaging, generous, charming, entertaining. He’s the guy in the room who puts everyone at ease; the guy who pulls out a punch line for almost any situation. Si doesn’t just make people smile, he makes them laugh out loud.
    For me, and many others, he has always been someone who is relentlessly healthy. Gentle-hearted but rock solid. A fighter. Impatient always, with his own weakness or vulnerability.
    Some loves in no particular order: aged cheddar by the chunk, banana bread, watching hockey, Paradis clan parties, CBC ’s
Ideas,
intelligence, skilled craftsmanship, Eli-in-motion, a soulful musical moment.
    Dislikes: kale, humorlessness, affectation of any kind, lack of conviction, New Agey faux spiritualism, sentimentality, mediocrity, smelly perfumes, slow drivers, gangsta rap.
    My most profound thanks to all the people at ICU who are taking such good care of him. He is a beautiful, good man, cherished by so many: me, Eli, his family and friends.
    I DON’T KNOW how often or by whom my wordy missive is read, and I do not think it has any impact on the overall excellent care he receives. But I notice two things: when I arrive at two in the morning, the on-duty nurse takes time to give me a detailed update or, if they are busy, a note addressed to me by name is waiting.
(Kara, Si had a pretty good evening. His pressures ( ICP ) have been much better and I’ve given him minimal extra meds. I have not had to paralyze him at all. I’ll be back at 4:00 and we can speak then. T)
Also, now, many of the nurses refer to him by name.
Okay, Si, I’m just going to moisten your lips.
Or:
Easy, Si, we’re going to roll you on your side.
And with this simple gesture, the use of his everyday name, he is, even in the depths of a coma, more present—the essential Si-ness of him—in that sterile, foreign, digitalized, glass room.

{ 10 }
A HOWLING STORM
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JULY 24, DAY 3
    THE DOCTORS—ALL NEW , unfamiliar faces and most so young they must be interns or residents—arrive for rounds before sunrise and once again explain to me that there will be no operation on Simon’s spine until his ICP is stabilized. Yes, I tell them, I understand. And I do, a little better than I did the night before. I am learning the meaning behind the acronyms: TBI is traumatic brain injury; an EVD is an external ventricular drain, and there is one inserted into the right side of Simon’s frontal lobe to drain excess amounts of cerebrospinal fluid, or CSF , to prevent a condition