It wasn’t so much that I didn’t want to get out of bed, as that I didn’t want to move at all.
No reason for it, really. It just seemed like one of those days.
Or, it could have been something to do with my impending doom- oops, I meant doctor’s appointment.
I’d been having strange episodes.
Well, ok, so maybe my entire life was a strange episode, but normally, I didn’t go around having to pretend I felt fine when, in fact, most of my body was in searing pain.
For no apparent reason.
Sometimes it was my head. Sometimes my stomach, or my leg. Most recently, it had been my ankle and my ribs.
I was falling apart, I just knew it. Death was imminent, the curtains were closing. I had one foot in the grave.
I can be a little over dramatic. Which is probably why I was lying in bed that morning, in my flannel pajamas, with the back of one hand to my forehead as if I might swoon at any moment.
The more I contemplated actually getting out from under the down comforter and putting at least one foot on the floor, the more I felt like I really might just faint. This was becoming a real problem.
I mean, I had places to be. People to see. Breakfast to throw up, diseases to discover, that sort of thing.
I was quite the busy woman, I’ll tell you.
It was something like miraculous that right at that moment, nothing on or in my physical body hurt at all. Granted, that may have been due to a high dosage of pain killers that I’d acquired somewhat illegally from a friend, but hey, I never look a gift horse in the eye.
Mouth.
Where ever.
Actually, I never look too close at any kind of horse, gift or otherwise. Except for those couple of times I was suckered into learning to ride. And then I was looking closely at the back of the horse’s head. Which isn’t all that impressive, to be quite honest, so I couldn’t ever really see the appeal of riding a horse. Spending all that time staring at the back of a horse head.
Or maybe I’m completely missing the point of riding.
I’ve been known to miss the point, occasionally.
Anyway. The clock was obnoxiously creeping steadily towards the hour when I would face my doom sayer. I briefly considered breaking the clock in a violent manner, you know, teaching it a lesson and all that, in the hopes that time might just stop and I could live forever, albeit in a weird kind of stasis, and looking like ten miles of rough road, as I did then. The only thing that changed my mind about the whole thing was that I most definitely didn’t want to hang in limbo for eternity with yesterday’s mascara smeared under my eyes. Welcome to Eternity, Rocky Raccoon.
No thanks.
Not that I had the power to stop time simply by busting up one clock. At least, I was fairly certain that I didn’t, although I had never attempted it.
Hmm.
I found the motivation to sit up and take hold of my bedside alarm clock. I set it in my lap, and watched as it changed from 7:37 to 7:38 and inevitably to 7:39. By 7:40, I was bored to tears.
So I scooped it up and bashed it against the night stand. That was sort of thrilling, so I did it again. And a few (dozen) more times.
I was laughing rather hysterically by the time I noticed that the digital numbers had fragmented themselves. I’d done it! I’d stopped time!
Just to make sure, I dropped the dilapidated clock on the floor and raced into the kitchen to check the clock there.
7:46.
7:47.
I sighed. Bitter disappointment made me call the clock a bastard.
It had been a ploy to get me out of bed. The clocks had sacrificed one of their own in order to draw me from my hide-out.
Believe you me, I would know better, next time.
That is, if there was a next time. I still had to find out what hideous ailment was about to take my life.
I really couldn’t stand it. Knowing I was doomed, knowing I had to go to a stark, cold doctor’s office to have a stark, cold stranger inform me I was doomed.
I thought about that for a minute. If I already knew I was going to die, what would be the point of paying someone else to tell me? I decided I just wouldn’t show for my appointment. I’d wait patiently in my bed for Death to take me.
Unfortunately, common sense kicked me in the head just then, and reminded me that if I didn’t show up, I’d still have to pay.
I hate common sense. I avoid it like the plague it is.
But, it did spur me into action. I threw on some clothes, washed my face, and pretended I cared what my hair looked like. I mean, when you die, someone dresses you up and makes you look nice, so what was the point of bothering too much, right?
Because some snippy little receptionist with a French manicure and bleached blonde hair and a better body than I could ever hope to have was expecting me within a half hour, I grabbed my car keys from their usual place under a couch cushion and walked out my front door. I kept my head held high, looking the world in the face. Or was it in the eye? Either way, I was feeling very brave in the face of persecution.
Or whatever.
When I slid behind the wheel of my car, I was suddenly gripped with a strong sense of loss. I was going to miss this car. Even though the ‘check engine’ light had been on for a year and a half. Even though the fuel pump was going bad. Even though it always took three tries before it would start.
I normally hated the damn thing, but I was feeling pretty sentimental that morning.
The ten-minute drive to the clinic was utterly painful.
I got cut off by two idiots, flipped off by a third when I failed to go on a green light, and honked at twice for cutting someone else off.
I love driving.
Anyway.
The doctor’s office was very quiet and lonely-looking. Of course, it was still early. In fact, I was the first appointment of the day.
I’d made sure of that.
Because, you know, finding out that you’re about to die is best done before 10 a.m.
I parked crooked, because I didn’t care. I actually felt a little sad that my car was too small to take up two spaces.
That makes me sound like a jerk, I know. But throughout my driving experience, I’ve always been the one to pull in to a packed parking lot, drive around it for twenty minutes to no avail, FINALLY find the very last space, only to find that some moron has parked two feet over the line, leaving no room for another car.
I felt justified.
Especially since I was going to die.
I also felt a little smug satisfaction (alongside a dose of jealousy) when I walked into the lifeless clinic and announced my arrival to a petite, chesty, bleached blonde with a French manicure. She insisted that I have a seat while I filled out a page worth of personal information.
I sat down on an uncomfortable chair and contemplated painting my fingernails when I got home.
After a few minutes of that, a nurse in her mid-thirties entered the lobby and called my name, informing me that Dr. Schpoogledyboo (or something very similar) would see me just then.
What if I didn’t want to see HIM? Huh? What then?
The nurse deposited me in a tiny room with one of those horrid bed/seat thingies covered with a thin sheet of crinkly paper. I hated it.
The paper, I mean. The room wasn’t so bad, if you took out the stupid crinkly paper.
And all the icky doctor’s office paraphernalia.
And the florescent lighting.
Oh, and me.
Yes, the room would have been quite lovely, had I not been looking at it.
Anyway.
I jumped through all the hoops the nurse set for me. Answered her questions. Yes, I smoked. No, I’d never been in a car accident. Yes, I regularly participated in crazy dare-devil stunts…
Wait, she hadn’t asked that.
To finish off her inquisition, she asked me to remove my pants and shirt and put on a crinkly paper gown.
I said, “No thank you, I don’t think I will.”
I even smiled when I said it.
She handed me the gown and walked out of the room, presumably to fetch Dr. Schpoygendoodle from his breakfast.
I really wasn’t planning on actually changing into the stupid gown. I was going to stand my ground, fight the man, all that. But, it occurred to me that the doctor might make me change anyway, or worse, if I kept dilly-dallying, he would probably walk in while I was in the middle of changing (because I knew I’d give in and just put the damn thing on).
I really didn’t enjoy being difficult, you know.
It’s just that, you see, I was going to be dying soon.
Dr. Schpagooble came in just as I was lifting myself up on to the horrible crinkly-papered examination table. You know, the bed/seat thingie.
Whatever.
He shook my hand with his cold, clammy one, and I wondered why doctors couldn’t warm their hands up before touching people.
Then he proceeded to ask me all of the questions I’d already been asked.
And then…
He started poking and prodding and commanding me to turn this way or move that way and let him know if anything in particular hurt.
Oddly, nothing did.
Which I found to be really inconvenient. I had figured that if I could just scream in pain once while I was there, nobody would think I was making it all up.
Ah, well. Can’t have everything.
After having Dr. Schpankidoo’s freezing cold hands all over me, I felt quite disgusted. The feeling only increased when eventually he stepped back, looked over the nurse’s notes, and hmm’d. He said,
“It looks like you’re about ten pounds overweight, for a woman your age and height.”
I was shocked. The nerve!
I mean, what a horrid thing to say to a woman whose chubby bits you’ve just dug your fingers into!
The big jerk.
Then he said, “Aside from that, and being under a lot of stress, I can’t find anything wrong with you. No swollen glands, nothing.”
My jaw dropped.
“And I’m not going to give you a prescription for any pain medications. I advise an over-the-counter pain reliever if you experience any more pain, and I also suggest you try to eat healthier and exercise three times a week.”
When he saw the look in my eyes, he quickly continued, “Because exercise is a known stress-reliever.”
Spectacular. Lovely. Wonderful.
Dr. Whatever-his-name-was left me to get dressed. I didn’t see him on my way out. Lucky for him.
I trudged to my car, highly disappointed. I was fine, but I was fat.
There was a piece of paper on my windshield. “Nice parking, @#$%^!”
So, I was going to live, but I was a fat @#$%^!
And it wasn’t even ten in the morning.
Cristen's Corner 