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| Apr. 19, 2003. 01:00 AM |
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| PETER POWER/TORONTO STAR |
| Legendary folksinger Gordon Lightfoot has bounced
back after a rare illness ruptured an artery near his
liver last fall. Today, he says he's not afraid of death
anymore. | | The comeback from death's door
Singer was in a coma for six weeks Now he's working on a new
albumDoctors say his conditioning saved his life
Singer
hop
BERNARD
HEYDORN
SPECIAL
TO THE STAR
A frail but determined Gordon Lightfoot is
working on a new album and hopes to begin touring again in 18
months, the legendary singer told the Star this week in his first
interview since falling seriously ill last September.
"I plan to fight my way back," said Lightfoot, 64, who now
faces two more operations in the wake of the abdominal hemorrhage
that nearly killed him.
"I probably won't get to play again until the fall of 2004,"
he added. "My goal is to get out there and do it again, whatever
that takes.
"The most important things to me now are: Don't spin your
wheels! Keep trying! Don't give up! There's always hope," he said.
Lightfoot, the Orillia-born folksinger whose international
hits include "Sundown" and "If You Could Read My Mind," shocked the
Canadian music world when he collapsed in pain in his dressing room
before a charity show in his hometown on Sept. 7 last year.
He was airlifted to hospital in Hamilton, where he remained
for three months. His family and friends kept a tight lid on
information about his condition, revealing only that he had suffered
internal bleeding from a blood vessel in his abdomen and that he was
not fully conscious for at least two months. He walked out of the
hospital in mid-December.
Lightfoot, who was candid, humble and engaging throughout the
75-minute interview, now says an artery ruptured near his liver as a
result of a rare disorder, and that he was in a coma-like state for
6 1/2 weeks.
"On the second morning of my two-night stand (in Orillia), I
felt a little off," the singer recounted in his Yonge St. office.
"It got worse, with pain in my lower abdomen. By sound-check time at
4 p.m., my band was waiting for me on stage and I was on the floor
of the dressing room.
"We didn't know what was happening. We went to emergency in
Orillia, and there I became unconscious. I did not wake up for
6 1/2 weeks. I was out cold. It was around Halloween by the
time I came to."
While he was unconscious, Lightfoot was operated on several
times to stop the bleeding, and he doesn't remember any of it.
"It was peaceful in my sleep," Lightfoot said. "It was fine.
If there was any post-operative pain, I didn't feel it."
When he was released from hospital, his doctors credited his
excellent physical conditioning for saving his life. The singer had
stopped drinking in 1982 and had started exercising.
While Lightfoot was in hospital, his band mates revealed that
the singer ran 16 kilometres a week and worked out four times a
week. The black T-shirt he wore to the interview this week revealed
his wiry and muscular frame.
But the rare ailment has taken its toll, Lightfoot said
frankly. "It has affected my voice and hearing, as well as my legs
and feet. I also had to have a tracheotomy (an operation to create
an air passage by cutting open the patient's throat and inserting a
tube into the windpipe). I had a strong heart and good lungs, and
that's why I'm sitting here.
"I'm on the road to recovery. I have two more operations
scheduled — one in three weeks and the other in five months.
"Most people die from what happened to me."
Lightfoot admitted that he briefly contemplated retiring
after waking up from his ordeal, "but that only lasted a minute or
two. I thought, `No spinning wheels allowed! I never allowed
spinning wheels in my life!'"
The singer, who has won 17 Juno awards and the Governor
General's Performing Arts Award, as well as the Order of Canada in
1970, said he decided to talk candidly about what happened to him as
a way of thanking fans for their support. The hospital in Hamilton
received a deluge of best wishes and sympathy cards that, according
to one nurse, was more than it had ever received before for any
other patient.
Lightfoot also wanted to acknowledge the support of
Elizabeth, his wife of 14 years, and his five children.
During the interview, he not only revealed that he was
continuing to work on an album — the 20th of his career — that he
had begun early in 2000 and for which he has written 23 songs, he
also played recordings of a few of them during this interview.
He admitted any songs he writes from here on might have a new
perspective. "In the past I had a fear of death," Lightfoot said.
"I've lost that fear. I feel much better about accepting death now."
He was also sanguine about his place in history as a
folksinger who helped define the music of the 1960s and '70s, and
whose songs have been covered by Bob Dylan and Elvis Presley.
"It's not really important to me. It's even less important
after you've been out for 6 1/2 weeks. You actually know how it
feels not to be here. I learned that."
Bernard Heydorn is an author, freelance writer and a former
member of the Star's community editorial board. He can be e-mailed
at mailto:bheydo0172@rogers.com?GXHC_gx_session_id_=d39d779bfc6c7cae&
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