I note a stray statistic: that hospitalizations increase
during holiday seasons. One lightly assumes that this is caused
by incontinent celebrations -- but apparently not. In fact, many
people check in for hospital treatment before the holidays
themselves, and lo! exactly this happened here, giving rise to
speculation about what to do when, suddenly, you are a "patient."
Much depends on whether you are a willing patient or a conscript.
But the following applies in either case.
(1) Food. Hospitals, like prisons, have the reputation of
being providers of sustenance guaranteed only to keep you alive.
But things are truly different in many modern hospitals, as with
the Stamford (Conn.) hospital where they are dithering with my
pneumonia.
What you do have to watch for is substance. People who are not
feeling well often compensate by eating, if not wantonly, at
least zestfully. And what you can run into, after the dinner is
consumed and the tray removed, is sheer hunger .
Happily, there is one solution entirely adequate and,
mercifully, easily effected. The answer is a jar of peanut butter
and a box of crackers. These slide easily into the cabinet
alongside your bed, and nobody's feelings are hurt when you
ingest two or three crackers heavily coated with peanut butter
(the world's primary contribution to health and pleasure) to
chase away any lingering sense of deprivation.
(2) Drink. Now here is a problem. If you are in the hospital
for treatment of alcoholism, the question is closed, and total
abstinence is obviously in order.
But most people who are in the hospital for a few days are not
looking to magnify discomforts, but to assuage them. The majority
of adults consume a ration of alcohol on a typical day. The glass
of wine with dinner is a matter of both sensuous pleasure and
psychological buoyancy.
Now hospitals do not serve wine, so the consumer needs to
infiltrate it in alongside the peanut butter. There are certain
practical considerations. Since the wine will need to be served
inconspicuously, you don't want a bottle that requires a huge
wine-opener, let alone one that requires the cooperation of an
orderly or nurse to operate it.
Well, your wife can send up the bottle uncorked and swathed in
gold paper with jingle bells.