Emergency

Perspectives from The Artist's Road

Awakening 18 x 42” Watercolor John Hulsey

While teaching a packed watercolor workshop for the Clay Watercolor Workshops in Cheyenne, Wyoming this June, my appendix burst. Not realizing what had happened, but feeling pretty uncomfortable, I finished out the first day of what was to be a week-long class. Back in the motel, exhausted, I thought I might just go to bed and see how I felt in the morning. That notion did not last long, as I awoke after a short time, realizing that something was very wrong. An hour later, the ER doctor on duty at a nearby medical center diagnosed a ruptured appendix. After a CAT scan I was sent up to surgery. By midnight, I was fixed and in recovery.

Unfortunately, because the appendix had burst, I was going to have to stay in the hospital a few days, missing my teaching obligations. Ann volunteered to step in and teach in my absence, saving the day and the workshop. I was so relieved! My next concern was the public presentation a…