NYRSF 345 Editorial: Ouch, Vile Jelly

I had hoped that this issue would be out the last week in January, but my plans got tossed into a cocked hat around the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday weekend when I noticed that my right eye had developed some large amentlike floaters and flashes of bright light at the edge. My ophthalmologist referred me to a specialist who spotted three small tears in the retina. This is a common condition in middle-aged nearsighted people, but it can get much worse very quickly, so she indicated that it would be the course of prudence to immediately submit to tender loving laser repair.

Laser retina surgery is simultaneously wondrous, tedious, and painful, like so many things in this future world in which we will spend the rest of our lives. Wondrous, in that a doctor is treating a serious threat to my vision by shining a bright light in my eye for half an hour. Tedious because I have to hold my head very steady for that half hour, looking up, looking left, looking right on command and clenched up waiting for the next full-on laser pulse. And painful, because that bright light is literally burning my retina. It’s not an intense pain, and it doesn’t feel like burning at all; it’s a mild pressure that just builds, a pressure that if were on the skin would lead to wincing and distracted rubbing, but it’s at the back of the eye socket instead.

As surgical procedures go, it’s really minor. But as Bernadette says (quoting Bill Griffith), there’s no such thing as minor surgery. It’s an assault on the body and the body responds by—well, in my case by sulking somewhat and not wanting to play. Going to work left me without much energy to spend on NYRSF.

I had a follow-up evaluation last Friday and my doctor identified another tear, near the edge of the area that she repaired. I received a shorter round of laser blasting, and I responded by spending 30 of the next 36 hours unconscious. (It is Tuesday as I write this, and I’m feeling better. I have minor flashing and a bit of “Kirby Krackle,” the small black flecks that I’ve recently learned are the shadows of blood drops in the vitreous humor. Vile jelly, indeed, and goth as heck. But these are to be expected.)

So how was your January?

A few additional notes: Our next issue, which I expect will be out toward the end of February, will have several substantial pieces about Ursula K. Le Guin, whose loss will I’m sure be felt even more keenly as the years go by.

SF awards season is slowly awakening, and in the now-common practice of reminding people of things that are awards-eligible: NYRSF published 7 issues in 2017 (#337–#344) and as such is eligible for the Hugos in the Semiprozine category.

Thank you for your continued support, and in turn I hope you all have happy, healthy winters.

—Kevin J. Maroney
and the editors

Like this, except with frickin’ lasers