The Waiting Has Officially Begun

Got the call that I am officially on the transplant list, and to be available 24/7. So yesterday I researched pager and phone options. Cell phones don’t work where we are, being below the ridge tops in a bit of a saddleback. Cell phone are line of sight. I found a local telecommunications company that has its own pager network. Tthey said they get better coverage in their area than cell phones. In addition, they give a free pager and service to anyone verifying they are on a transplant list. So I will see if it works at our house. That would simplify things. We have a phone service package that includes call waiting but I hadn’t activated it because if I was on the internet with my dialup connection, I would get bumped. I found out I could put the deactivation code into the dialup number sequence, and not be bothered while online, and when I hang up the call waiting is automatically reactivated. I can now get calls while someone is talking on the phone without voice mail stepping in. Leaves blank spots while online and outside, but the pager should fill that void if it works here.

The difficulty is the transplant nurse won’t leave messages. I tried to make the case that my outgoing voice mail messages differentiate between “no one is here to take your call”, and “the line is currently busy”. It seems leaving a message on “busy” would be as valuable as calling a pager, which in essence is also leaving a message, but my points fell on the deaf ears of “policy.”

They will call lots of numbers, so as a backup, Kuladri and Balabhadra have agreed to list their numbers. They are generally reachable. I’ll give them a list of neighbors they could call if someone needs to stop by and see if I am indeed home, if they can’t..

The pager is a local company, serving the Upper Ohio Valley, including Pittsburgh, and as far north as Butler, where Srila Prahbupada first stayed when he came to America. They go east to Morgantown and south some. That covers every place I usually go. The problem will be Columbus, Ohio where my daughter Manjari is expecting a baby in June. Hard to consider never going there, but we’ll work something out.

Ultimately, it is in Krishna’s hands. I am using my intelligence to make a network, but if He doesn’t want me to get a new liver, He’ll find a way to make it misfire and I won’t receive my notification. If I don’t contact the transplant center within an hour or two, they move on to the next name. The window of usability for a liver is narrow, and they won’t waste one. They usually call two people – the primary, and a second as backup in case the primary doesn’t make it timely. So He has the means to veto this process, if that is His desire.