Yesterday I had an outing with M which I had prepared for during the previous day and night through calculated alterations to what I put into my body. From early on in our lives, long before the Fourth Quarter begins, even the healthiest among us are subjected to intrusions into the many orifices of our Swiss Cheesed (and Klein-bottled) bodies. We learn the name of the explorer that enters our Ears, Noses and Throats, a tool that will be joined later by more invasive hoses that enter one's nose, wend their way beyond that epiglottis thing boogling in the back of your throat that isn't your tonsils. We learn that it's OK to gag on big fat popsicle sticks and young women by puberty learn that being back in the saddle and stirrups doesn't always require a Texas "yee-hah." Members of both gender classes find out the there are many orifices from which to draw blood and that women doctors are preferable to male ones, particularly those whose hands are dainty enough not to cause too much pain when it's crammed up your Sphinctor Magnum. Scopes and Needles, Needles and Scopes. ........................... Ah, but the Last Quarter and into overtime when it occurs, the writers of our Maleus Maleficarum, the how-to book of the Inqisitors .... Inquisition for Dummies!! .... those guys had something special up their sleaves. .................... The day that Docs discovered that tubes of various diameters can be fitted with cameras for finding the lost passages to (1) the bladder; (2) the bowel and large intestines (Geez! leftovers from that "procedure" can be used to water the distant edges of an English Garden); and (3) a shorter and smaller diameter "probe" ... "hose" ..... "scope" ..... can go down your esophagus ("make way, Gus!) through the Gastro-Esophogeal sphinctor and then South by Southwest through your stomach into the small intestine. Who knew? Dad/Mom wasn't really going to "Talk to a man about a horse" but was being "scoped" in search of thosebrain lesions that make them forget the names of the intruders! Embarassing, I guess, for parents to tell their grown kids that someone is sticking a garden hose up their asses trying to find evidence of sentient life ...................... OK, OK, OK .... Enough bathroom humor. .... This time it was the upper and lower Gastro-intestinal picnics that are prepared for by swallowing a variety of minor poisons that empty things out sufficiently for spelunkers to explore for cave drawings and other expected growths. ............................... I said expected growths. The Fourth Quarter in the West is not where it was a century ago and not where it is in Sub-Saharan Africa, today. We -- many of us -- live a long time ... and not only our brains forget but so, indeed, does our DNA which forgets how to reproduce, itself, without suddenly replicating so many clones of one kind of cell that it threatens and does choke off life.Ach ... I'm not a cell biologist but a patient getting scoped. ............................ So what were the excitements of the day? ........................ (A) M and I arrived on time with me driving very quickly for fear, as we say to kids, of an accident .... not a car accident but a "time to get the diapers" accident .... our lease ends in 7 weeks and ... anyhow, it woulda/coulda been embarassing. (B) The receptionist smiled ... she smiled a lot ... and talked so quickly that her lip movements became a blur. I did hear something about how I had a sharp eye for noticing the X next to the word signature and that I'd be called to "go back" when (*#%^&&%##$^&*(^%$. (C) The Nurse, when I got back, talked equally as fast and she didn't ewant to be there and didn't want anyone to know that. "She was Ginny and I was Howard, my veins sucked and it was sunny, outside." After three tries, Ginny wanted me to see that the tube just wasn't flowing with blood. "Shame," I thought, but I was hiding under a sheet in a Johnny Coat and funny socks ... "You gotta look." ... "No, thanks." .... That conversation went on for her repeated attempts to get my veins to cooperate. Ginny said: "I'll go get Richard. He's good at this." We learn quickly that Old People don't have good veins and by the tone of the blood-suckers that just isn't right. (D) Richard had a rough time too, but he persevered and was friendly. How important that is. Richard actually seemed to want to be there. I guess it's not as disturbing as a lover who really wants to be somewhere else, but disturbing, nonetheless. We had spoken on the phone, too, for they had needed a clearance from my heart doctor (all my cardios are younger than my kids and are in charge of permitting me this and that) to proceed. Richard was a good guy and so was the anesthesiologist who was to come next ... and I'll pick up on that later. ................. For now, I'm struck by how it's still important for me while Playing in the Last Quarter to be treated with dignity, maybe especially when I'm about to be penetrated while under the effects of something akin to ... a date-rape drug. Pick up on this thought, tomorrow.
Off to work ....
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