It must have been somewhere past midnight. I was trying to fall asleep on a lumpy mattress in a second-rate nursing home where I'd landed after busting a calf muscle. The place was most likely the best option my garbage insurance covered. I was 36 years old at the time, and clearly one of the youngest, most aware, and sanest people in the joint. It took moving rooms three times to find one where I could actually sleep, thanks to the ridiculous noise level of aged elevator hydraulics, door alarms going off any time of day or night, and high-pitched tones of nurse call-buttons they took their sweet time answering. I had talked to my friend on