Addiction, Part One

When I got out of the military, I needed a break. I also needed to pay some bills. I had just one small problem – under the “Applicable Skills” section of job applications, the only thing I could honestly put down were things like “Locating, closing with, and destroying the enemy”. Being“expert at long distance precision marksmanship, concealment, and field craft techniques” will not endear one to an HR department fueling The Engine of American Capitalism. I’d had a turn at some backbreaking landscaping jobs, both in High School and between my hitches in the service, and I really didn’t want to go back to that sort of thing. Let me tell you – it is a Good Thing to work indoors.

It is a sad shock to look around at the age of twenty six and realize the only things you are good at involve shooting at people, digging holes, or digging a hole frantically while people shoot at you. Bouncing seemed like a good choice while I got my bearings.

I was surprised by how much I liked it at first. The bar was a nice one, the patrons were mostly laid back, and if you’re a withdrawn loner with an anger problem, bouncing is a great way to break out of your shell. You are forced by the atmosphere to be happy and welcoming. You socialize for a living, and that is a great thing if your normal leisure activities consist of sitting alone in a bare apartment. Fringe benefits include occasionally pounding the hell out of douche bags that get grabby with the cocktail waitresses and free Jack Daniel's. The whole routine is more therapeutic than any selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor ever invented. If you are reading this and are a burned out old (read: mid-twenties) vet with no real job skills other than violence, I highly recommend this course of action.

I even reconnected with an old friend of mine named Andy. It was a shock to see him at that bar, in the heart of The Yuppie Dominion. Andy and I went to elementary and middle school together in the same shitty neighborhood. I had moved away, finished high school, and gone into the military. Andy had stayed in the old neighborhood, dropped out at sixteen, and followed his brothers and father into the family business – selling cocaine. Andy had big plans – he was expanding the family business. He was tired of spending his days and evenings in crackhouses, selling twenty sacks to toothless criminals. He was here, downtown, selling high quality blow to hot waitresses and successful yuppies.

Andy clued me in to some things I had not noticed. Behind every downtown bar scene, there is a shadow drug economy. Stand in the middle of your favorite large drinking establishment and you’ll see it. There will be a subset of people who go to the bathroom every twenty minutes. There will be skinny, tired looking girls with hypnotically dilated pupils. There will be babbling, empty headed men who ask where the after-party is five times in the course of an hour. Fifteen minutes of standing near the bar watching Andy work was like learning a new language.

I watched cocaine and alcohol use do it’s work on several people over the course of a few years. The one that sticks out in my head the most is a guy I’ll call AJ. When I met AJ, he was a personal trainer at an expensive gym. I introduced him to Andy at one of the ubiquitous after parties, and the fuse was lit. I don’t know why Andy singled out AJ, but he did. Perhaps AJ reminded Andy of someone who'd bullied him in school. Maybe Andy hated AJ because AJ had all the things Andy did not - a stable job, hot girlfriend, and a good family. Normally, Andy was that rarest of coke dealers – a man with a code of honor and a sort-of conscience. He would refuse to sell to people he deemed “out of control”. He also never, ever fronted people drugs. He was strictly pay-for-play. Not with AJ, though. Andy sold AJ as much coke as AJ wanted. He even fronted him huge amounts – sometimes entire paychecks worth. After AJ got really going with the blow, Andy showed him how to make crack. That was the kiss of death for AJ – he went from a strapping, tanned meat head to a pale, skinny, sunken eyed crack head who was barely tolerated by anyone. He lost his job, and began living on credit cards.

One night I walked into the bar to start my shift, and Andy came up to me.

“Yo, nigga. You wanna see sum fucked up shit?”

“Sure, Andy. What’s up?” I said.

“Lookit this text that dumb nigga AJ sent me.”

I took his phone, and read the texts:

AJ: Hey man, I’m hurtin. Can u front me?

Andy: No. I need to re-up.

AJ: When u do, hit me up.

Andy: U got money?

AJ: How about if you front me, my girl will suck ur dick now and I’ll pay you Monday.

“Holy shit. That’s fucked up,” I said. “What did you tell him?”

“Nothin’. Imma delete his numba right now. That nigga be crazy. Don’t let him in here tonight, aight?”

“Sure thing, Andy.”

I gave my two weeks notice a few days later, and haven’t talked to Andy since. I haven’t been back to that bar in almost two years. Once in awhile, Guilt still twists her knife in my guts, torturing me for that whole situation. I hate it – there are many things I wish I could erase from my mind, and that one is pretty far up there.

I thought by going to school and staying out of bars I could avoid that kind of thing. I don’t like watching people destroy themselves. I like even less having any involvement - even a periphery one. I know what it is to live with intense, overpowering guilt and regret. I hate seeing people take on a load of it. War and drugs will make people do things on impulse, in the heat of the moment, that they will regret for the rest of their lives.

The other day I saw a doctor do something Andy would do, and I want to kick him in his fucking face.

The meaning of sick

I work part time at a busy, urban, high acuity emergency department, and part time at a nice suburban urgent care. The contrasts between the two places are stark. No one ever dies at an urgent care. Most people walk in. Most people speak English. Most people pay for their health care. Most people are responsible citizens who take charge of their health. Many of them are also pussies. I’ve seen a grown man scream and faint while getting three stitches put in his index finger. He’d had a horrible, tragic accident with a corkscrew while opening a bottle of wine. I’m sure the sight of three drops of blood on his single slab granite countertops was the horrifying high point of his year. His two porcelain doll daughters wailed uncontrollably in the waiting room. His brave Stepford wife wrung her hands constantly, worry lines in her forehead nearly overcoming Botox paralysis.

At the ED, things are different. Lots of those people are desperately ill, horribly irresponsible, or both. I once took care of a dude who ripped some staples (an alternative in some cases for stitches) out of his head. He was drunk and fell off his ATV. How’d he get the staples in the first place, you ask? Well, Dear Reader, he was riding his ATV, drunk, the week before. While I was cleaning gravel out of his scalp, we were bullshitting in pidgin Spanish about which nurses we’d like to fuck. At one point, I could see the periosteum covering his skull. We both had a pretty good time, as I recall. Neither one of us knew the meaning of “helmet” in Spanish.

The definition of the word “sick” is not the same in both places, either. Sick in the urgent care is a sore throat, a migraine, an upset tummy. Sick in the ED means the Grim Reaper is out at triage, asking after a patient. If someone says you are sick in the ED, you’ve got problems. That discrepancy bit me in the ass the other day at the urgent care.

I should have known better. Doc Goodguy is like me – he puts in some time at an ED across town. We share moments of eye rolling and semi-feigned concern about sniffles. We make fun of soccer moms that require a wheelchair and assistance in the bathroom after spraining their wrists playing tennis. We know that a child with a 104.2 degree fever in the ED is fucking serious, and the same “104 degree fever” at the urgent care was obtained by a terrified first time dad with an axillary thermometer that has been sitting next to a mug of boiling Theraflu for twenty minutes.

“Hey, Savage Henry. The guy in room five is pretty sick. I need some bloods drawn – get me a CBC, CMP, and a stool O and P. Send ‘em out stat,” Doc Goodguy said.

“Okay, Doc.” Stool sample. Fuck. I flipped immediately to Gross Out Mode. Gross Out Mode is a semi-Zen trance I am capable of, wherein my sense of smell disappears and my long term memory is set to “Standby”. My reflexes become catlike, in order to dodge flung bits of mucus, sailing vomit, drunkenly propelled spittle, and explosive diarrhea. I’m like a superhero whose talents are keeping clean and forgetting about wounds that would preclude a mortal man from eating lasagna.

I got my gear together and entered room five.

“Hello, sir. I’m Savage Henry and I’m here to collect some samples from you. How are you feeling?”

“Oh, I feel like Hell. I just came back from vacation in Mexico, and I think Montezuma got me,” the man said.

“That’s too bad. We’ll get you fixed up, though. I need to get some blood from you, and a stool sample. Which would you like to give first?”

“Stool sample?”

“Yes sir!” I said brightly. See, you’ve got to sell the stool sample. People are less embarrassed if they think you’re really interested poop. I held up the stool collection containers like a hunter displaying a brace of pheasants.

“Ugh. Let’s do the blood first.” I need to get Zig Ziglar to write a book about selling stool samples.

“Absolutely, sir. Do you have a problem with needles?”

“Well, I’m not a fan, but I really want to get better. Do what you have to do.”

“Okie dokie, let’s get started.”

I palpated for a vein, cleaned off the spot on the inside of his elbow, and struck red gold on the first try. I could tell the guy was dehydrated by how slowly his blood rolled into the collection tube.

“Oh man, I don’t feel so good,” the man moaned.

“Hold still sir, we’re halfway done.” I swapped the first collection tube for the second and final one.

“Ohh…I don’t feel goooooood…” The man began to tremble slightly. I could feel the vibration through the needle buried in his vein. I stared at the blood slowly….slowly….slowly filling the tube. He began to sway back and forth, sweat popping on his forehead.

“Hold still, sir! Hold still if you can!” Fill, damn you!

“UhhhhIgottago!”

The man lurched up from the exam table, headed toward the door.

“WAIT! WAIT!” I yelled. I whipped the needle out of his arm, and contorted like a drunk yoga instructor, simultaneously trying to keep pressure on the venipuncture site and avoid stabbing him with the needle.

“I’m gonna puUUUGGHGHIIIOOOAARPHHHHLURGGEOOOPH” The man erupted with vomit. A stream reminiscent of the Belagio fountains blasted into my shoulder. Only my Gross Out Mode reflexes allowed me to avoid being hit in the chin.

“I GOTTA GOOOOoooo” The man sprinted toward the bathroom. Both hands were covering his mouth. Blood from the venipuncture site on his arm drooled off his elbow, spattering the floor. Halfway to the bathroom, one hand came away from his mouth and clamped onto his anus. While fumbling with the doorhandle, a thin, semi-clear stream of liquid yellow shit squirted from between his fingers. The man dove into the bathroom, door slamming behind him.

I stood dripping in the doorway of the room.

Doc Goodguy poked his head out of the office and surveyed the damage.

After a minute, he looked at me and said, “What the hell, Savage Henry? I told you that guy was sick.”

“Sick?”

“Yeah, sick.”

“Oh. Like ED sick.”

“Yeah. ED sick.”

“Fuck.”

My stab at writing a romance story for a female audience

I met him in line at the grocery store. I never knew how much people all around the world would love me at the time.

I was flipping through the magazines in the checkout isle, trying figure out the best hairstyle for my face shape. Who can keep up? It’s almost impossible to be a woman in today’s world. At least I had some Dreyer’s Grand and Jeno’s Pizza Rolls to share with my kitties when I got home. I sighed, and put the latest Cosmo in my cart when I overheard the man behind me. I’m good at hearing over cubicle walls at work (just ask that bitch Jasmine and her ex-boyfriend!) so eavesdropping in the grocery line was no problem.

“I just don’t know, Johnson! It’s got to be some kind of code!” the rugged man growled into his cell phone.

“If we don’t solve it, the terrorist will poison all of L.A.!” Beads of sweat started at his temples. His hairstyle was kind of cute, but also a little last year, if you know what I mean.

“Montag…..Montag….It sounds German. Doesn’t it mean Monday?...Yeah…I suppose it could be a name too…If we could only figure it out…” The big man was really bearing down on his phone with his scarred, manly fingers…fingers that were oddly sensual and understanding. Those tanned, athletic fingers kneading the phone were what made me decide to help him.

“Excuse me, Mister, but are you talking about Heidi Montag from the Hills?” I put just the right amount of sassiness in my tone. Sassiness will get them every time, just like it says in Elle! I hope you are taking notes, ladies!

“Hang on Johnson – we might have been saved by….an angel…” I heard the breath catch in his throat as he looked me deep in my eyes. Our eyes locked in a moment of tenderness, trust, and compassion. Somehow, we had a connection deeper than anyone had ever had. He looked deep into my soul, and found the answer that would save millions of innocent people.

“Of course! Johnson, send the react team to arrest Heidi Montag! This must be a revenge plot against that bitch Lauren Conrad! Why didn’t we think of this before! Right….keep me informed. I have a debt to pay – not that we’ll ever be able to fully repay this beautiful, enchanting woman I just met. Right! Secret Agent Striker signing off!”

“I don’t think you will ever understand how much everybody in the world will love you now! You just saved the entire Western Seaboard of the United States! You have saved Hollywood!” He looked deep into my eyes again, lost in a swirling tumult of emotion. He stepped close to me, and I inhaled his masculine musk. It penetrated me to my core. As he stroked my frosted hair, I was glad I had skipped the L’Oreal Home Touch Up Treatment and gone to the salon yesterday. He picked me up in his tan, corded arms. His lips trembled with lust.

“I have to have you,” he said in a throaty whisper. To be honest, girls, I was ready to let him have his way right there, but my mom says not to be one of those “easy” girls.

“Well, I suppose you could take me to dinner,” I quipped, still in sassy mode.

“Anything for you, my love!” Secret Agent Striker said, devotion lighting his face.

To be honest, I can’t remember where we went to eat, but it was even nicer than Olive Garden. I was a little embarrassed when I got a standing ovation from the crowd, and all the camera flashes made it hard for Striker to gaze longingly at my face. Dinner went well though, so I wasn’t surprised when Striker pulled out the small velvet box and got on his knee.

“You are brave, resourceful, and sassy. You have the most beautiful eyes and best maintained hair of any woman I have ever met. Your wardrobe choices are always sensible and practical, with a hint of cutting edge style that I find irresistible. I can’t draw another breath on this Earth if you aren’t by my side….Will you marry me?”

“Of course I will, Striker!” The crowd went wild as he slipped the six carat, D, FL, Princess cut ring from Tiffany’s onto my finger.
Striker leapt to his feet and glared at the crowd. In a voice that marked him as a leader of men, he growled at the adoring throng.

“I need time alone with my beautiful, heroic fiancé.” The restaurant emptied in seconds. Immediately he stripped off his Armani Tuxedo, revealing his tan, athletic body. I ran my hands over his scarred, masculine torso.

“You must have suffered so much pain,” I said, caressing his bullet wounds, shrapnel scars, and an axe wound, all of which detracted not in the slightest from his mobility or the lethal, oiled grace with which he moved.

“I will never hurt again, as long as you are by my side,” he breathed. His tan, athletic penis strained toward me, throbbing with unbridled lust. As he gently and sensually undressed me, being careful not to wrinkle my fashionable outfit, he looked deep into my eyes again.

“There is something you should know…”

“Anything, Striker. You can tell me anything now, my love.”

“Even though I am a super secret agent in the service of my country, a fireman, and a Board Certified Plastic Surgeon, I also own several production companies, as well as a controlling interest in Viacom. I want to show you to the world, and release the inner cultural icon you are hiding. I will use every penny of my eight figure per year income to do it. I will work every day, tirelessly for you!”

Girls, it was when Striker said this that I realized: Here is a man who is worthy of me. Here is a man who finally understands who I am on the inside.
“Take me,” I whispered. The heat from the lust in Striker’s eyes ignited several candles on the surrounding tables. His undying, unconditional love for me caused the restaurant’s PA system to play soft, erotic music.

“Lie on your back, and let me worship your body…you don’t have to move…everything you do is perfect…”

I shuddered in ecstasy over and over again. When his tan, athletic penis slipped into me, I could feel every vein and bulge of his engorged manhood on my beautiful, sassy womanhood. I’ll bet Jill, that bitch from Accounting never got made love to like this!

Because I’m classy, I can’t tell you everything, girls! Anyway, I have to go. It’s time for Striker to vacuum the beachfront castle he built for me. He is hopelessly lost without me to supervise him while he cleans. He loves my little suggestions!

Men! Where would they be without us?

Mom says no? Just ask Dad!

Flu season is kicking off pretty early, delivering enthusiastic fountains of vomit, acres of fevered flesh, and tanker trucks of viscous, foul smelling diarrhea to my place of employment. Amidst the viral war being waged on the population of my city, life is still going on. People are still cutting fingertips off in food preparation accidents, acromio-clavicular separations occur in young football players per usual, smokers still die their slow deaths, and somebody is still letting these idiots smash into each other with automobiles.

At times like this, we few, we happy few beleaguered health care workers are sometimes forced to enlist unwilling allies. When things are busy, we show all the compassion of a Royal Navy press-gang.

“You – Parent! Control your child. Hold him like this. I’m GIVING the injection NOW.”

Alcohol swab, stick, aspirate, thumb push, band-aid, POW! I’m out the door, moving faster than the sound waves created by wailing children. It’s busy as hell, and I’ve got shit to DO.

I don’t like working like this. It’s not why I got into this business. I like to give out lollipops and Otter Pops to brave children. I like to make nervous young men laugh. I like to shoot the shit with old folks. I like to see faces relax, to be there when some painful unknown is explained, understood, and conquered. I like rolling the positive emotions around in my mind, like you do with a nice red wine on your tongue. Savoring the good is a fine thing indeed.

Doing work the fast way is only made tolerable by the slow times, when I can explain and comfort. The situation is even harder on the semi-willing, unknowing helpers we dragoon into our ranks.

I helped the stressed out Doctor Worksfast take care of a little girl the other day. She was around five, with a nasty infected cyst on her little belly. The cyst was the size of a golf ball- hot, angry, and inflamed. It hurt her so bad she walked with her hands stuffed in the hem of her shirt, keeping the cloth from rubbing on the bump.

Normal procedure is to numb the area with a series of Lidocaine injections, cut a small slit into the cyst, and squeeze out the crap inside. Sometimes, depending on what kind of cyst it is, the doc will be able to pull the whole thing out at once in one evil, satisfying little sac. A small sample will be collected and sent to the lab. We then insert a thin strip of gauze packing into the cavity, allowing the wound to drain for a few days. On an adult with some pain tolerance, the procedure is routine and simple. I’ll bet the docs I work for could do it drunk and blindfolded.

On a terrified little kid, the procedure is not so simple. Lidocaine burns for about twenty seconds when it is first applied. It feels like a cloud of rioting sunburn has been injected under your skin, roiling away from the pinch of the needle stick. If you close your eyes, it is easy to imagine the formerly nice doctor standing over your body with a tiny flamethrower, torching off your skin. The fire soon dissipates, replaced with an odd absence of feeling and the heartfelt belief that the now numb body part is four times it’s usual size. If you managed to keep your eyes closed through all this dicking around with an imaginary flamethrower, you might have a tear or two in the corner of your eye.

Our scared little girl did not like this one bit. The trouble started with the first needle stick and Lidocaine injection.

“Ow, mommy. That hurts.”

I saw Dr. Worksfast’s jaw set. My heart went out to the little girl.

Doc Worksfast popped the needle into the next spot on her little belly, starting a perimeter around her cyst.

“OOooo mommy! It burns. It hurts!” Her little hip came up off the table.

Doc Worksfast looked at me and said quietly,”Hold her. I need to get this done.”

I put my big paws on her hip bones and kept her from squirming while the next Lido injection went in. I have some scars on my knuckles you can see through latex gloves, and they looked terrible holding her down.

“OWWWIIIEEE mommy! It hurts it hurts it hurts it huuuuurrrrts!” went the little girl.

“Get me an eleven blade,” said Doc Worksfast.

I took my ugly hands off that poor little girl and ripped open the scalpel package. By the time I handed the Doc the scalpel, the little girl had curled into the fetal position, protecting her stomach. She was crying in earnest now, one hand across her belly and the other one clutching her mother’s arm.

Doc Worksfast looked at the mother.

“We’ve got to get that out of her. This is the best way to do it, and she’s probably numbed up by now. I need you to help hold her down. OK?”

The mom just nodded. She was crying, too. Doc Worksfast has a great voice for stuff like this. He’d make a good Platoon Commander with that tone.

I said some bullshit in a kind way, and got Mom situated. We pried the little girl open like you’d open a recalcitrant mouse trap, and got back to work.

The incision happened without a whimper from the girl. Doc Worksfast worked a hemostat around in the wound, loosening up the connective tissue. The trouble began again when he started squeezing the cyst.

“AHHHhhHA MOOOMMIIEEE! It HUUUURRTS!”

Doc Worksfast kept squeezing.

“MAKE IT STOP MOMMY! OHH GOD IT HURTS! OH GOD MOMMY MAKE. IT. STOP!”

“I know baby! It’s almost over!” The mom was holding the girls shoulders down, dripping tears into her daughter’s face. I held the girl’s hips down. The girl was busy screaming and kicking me repeatedly in the balls.

Doc Worksfast was busy squeezing.

“OHHH AHHH MOOOOMMMY! IT HURTSSOBAAAD! MAKE IT STOOOOOP!”

Squeezing.

“I HATE YOU MOMMMYY AAHHHHGGHGHH! WHY WONT YOU MAKE IT STOOOOOOOOOPPPPPppp.”

The little girl was trying to bite her mother. She was more than trying to kick me in my junk.

Still squeezing, the Doc was.

“I WANT MY DAAAAAADYYYYY! OH GOD IT HUUUUURTS GET MY DAAAADY! I NEED MY DADDY OH GOD!”

Then, audible over the girl screaming, the mother sobbing, and a child’s size three sneaker impacting upon my testicles came a wonderful, delightful, heaven sent noise. The cyst popped open with the sound of a fresh fall apple’s skin breaking on your front teeth. A shot glass’s worth of gray and yellow gunk wormed out of the bloody incision on the girl’s little belly.

Doc Worksfast swabbed some for the lab and wiped the mess away. The little girl, exhausted, relaxed. I took my hands off her and surreptitiously checked to make sure my boys were still attached.

There was a moment of silence.

“I’m sorry, baby, but you’re going to be all better now,” the mother said, going in for a hug.

The little girl pushed her away and turned her head.

“Mommy, you didn’t help me! It hurt and you didn’t help me! You helped them hurt me!”

Doc Worksfast packed the wound with gauze. I cleaned everything up and bandaged the girl.

The mother lost her shit in the corner.

Stuff I wonder about

I’m a bit of a voyeur. Not the hang around your bathroom window masturbating type of voyeur, but an emotional voyeur. Being in healthcare affords me plenty of opportunities to feed my proclivities. Sooner or later everyone has to visit the emergency room or the urgent care. This job allows me to observe people in all kinds of circumstances. One of the frustrating things about my voyeurism is not ever knowing the back story.

I had a patient awhile ago at my Urgent Care that rubbed some salt in this particular voyeuristic wound I have. She was a late fifties woman brought in with shortness of breath and dizziness. I could tell she had been very attractive in her day, but time and personality had not been kind to her. She had worry lines in her forehead, a down turned, tightly frowning mouth, too much makeup, and badly colored hair. Her oxygen saturation was bouncing around in the mid sixties, so the Doc ordered oxygen and a chest X-Ray to rule out pneumonia and other lung pathologies. Getting a chest X-Ray can be a vulnerable time for a lady, as the requisite attire is an open backed paper hospital gown, sans bra. As if this wasn't bad enough, they must pose in a manner reminiscent of a pin up poster model while I bustle around them, getting the shielding right, collimating the beam, hanging films, measuring things, and occasionally cursing under my breath at the stupid fucking computer. There are all kinds of clicks and whirs, strange lights, and cold surfaces. I’m sure it’s no fun for the patient, so if circumstances allow I like to have a family member present as much as possible in the x-ray room. Pretty routine stuff.

What piqued my interest was this exchange:

“Ma’am, I’m going to wheel you back to the x-ray machine now. We’re going to take a couple of pictures of your heart and lungs.”

She looked at me, her arms crossed across her paper covered chest. I noticed a lacy black bra prominently draped over the exam table. Her bony elbows didn’t conceal the losing fight her breasts were having with gravity and time. Nobody wins that two front war. She cocked her head to the side and jutted her chin forward, saying nothing.

“Some patients are more comfortable with family in the room. Do you want your husband to come with you?”

“He’s my EX-husband, and he can just STAY here.”

Holy awkward, Batman.

“Okie dokie (yes, I say dumb shit like that). Let’s get started.”

She got up off the exam table and settled in to the wheelchair. Her EX-husband swirled around her like a Labrador who’s trying to get back in its master’s good graces. He shot sidelong glances at her and me, but was quick with a hand on the oxygen tubing. He got in my way when I loaded up the oxygen tank. When I spun the patient around in her wheelchair, he made a production of staying in her field of view. He awkwardly jumped to open the door.

Once we got into the exam room, her demeanor changed. She slumped a bit and uncrossed her arms. She posed without complaint, letting her once awesome boobs dangle out at the world. Most women will make an unconscious effort to keep their backs to me, but she obviously didn’t care.

When I was wheeling her back to the exam room, she changed again. It was like watching someone put on a suit of armor, or gear up for a raid. Her posture straightened, her arms crossed, and her expression was hard again by the time we entered the room. I’ve seen that look on Marine’s faces after they jack a round into their rifles and step out toward the wire.

After the Doc looked at her x-rays, he ordered a nebulizer treatment. I set up the neb, and put in the medicine.

“Alrighty, ma’am. Make sure you breathe deeply. This should open up your lungs, let you breathe easier. Some patients say it tastes funny, but don’t worry about that.”

She just put out her hand, palm up. Her EX-husband leapt up, grabbed the mouthpiece from me, and handed it to her with a flourish. He tried to stroke her face, but she turned away, chin up so high that if it had been raining, she would have gotten water in her nostrils.

Obligation and retribution hung in the air like fog.

I went off, did some other stuff, and checked in on her a few minutes later. Usually, people’s O2 sats will come up after a few minutes on oxygen and the nebulizer. Her’s was still right where they were when she came in. Some patients need a little coaching to breathe the medicine, and I figured that must be the case here.

“Ma’am, I need you to breathe in deeply, then exhale through your nose. Can you do that for me now?”

She rolled her eyes, the plastic neb mouthpiece obviously precluding whatever acid retort she’d normally fire back. She did what I asked, though. She also did something a little unusual – she began alternating her glances at me and the O2 sat readout. Most patients sit with their eyes closed or stare fixedly at the numbers that indicate how the ol’ pulmonology is going. I’m like a piece of the machine to most people - I only get looked at if I speak. This lady was looking at me like an adversary. Her O2 sat blinked from 64% to 65%.

I turned away and busied my hands with the jars and medicine wrappers on the counter. As soon she thought my attention was off her, I could hear her breathing change. Gone were the slow steady inhalations, the booger whistling in her nose as she exhaled. Instead, she breathed in shallow pants. Her O2 sat blinked from 65% to 64%.

“Ma’am, please breathe deeply, like we talked about”, I said.

“Honey, breathe in the medicine,” the EX husband added.

She turned her face to the EX husband like an M-1s traversing turret. She took the mouth piece out.

“I AM doing it. It just isn’t HELPING,” she said to him. She crammed the mouthpiece back in and glared at the EX husband until his eyes dropped.

Right then, I knew I wasn’t going to win this one. I got the Doc when the neb finished. Her O2 sat was pegged right at 64%, like I knew it would be.

“Mrs. Johnson, we’re going to have to…,” Dr. Goodguy began.

“It’s Miss Johnson, Doctor,” she interrupted.

“Alright, Miss Johnson. We’re going to have to send you to the hospital. We can’t get your oxygen saturation up where it’s supposed to be here, and we’re going to be closing soon. I can’t let you go home as sick as you are.”

Miss Johnson’s eyes lit up a bit at this. Most folks look worried or frustrated when they get told that a hospital is necessary.

“Very well, Doctor. HE can drive me.”

“Well, it’s not that simple. I have to send you by ambulance, since you’re not responding well to the treatment. I can’t let something happen to you,” Doc Goodguy said. I could see he was getting ready to argue liability and malpractice issues with a recalcitrant patient.

“Hmmm…Well, HE will just have to follow along behind the ambulance, then.”

“Okay, then. I’ll call and let the ER know you’re coming over.” Doc Goodguy bounced out of the room, not believing how easy that was.

We got Miss Johnson ready for transport, then handed her over to the Paramedics.

“Hold my purse and meet me at the hospital,” she commanded the EX husband.

EX husband was standing in front of me, the doc, and six firemen. He didn’t even look embarrassed.

“Well, it doesn’t look like you’re going to make it back to YOUR HOUSE in time for dinner, does it,” Miss Johnson said to EX husband as she was loaded in to the ambulance.

He didn’t look at her, just turned and started to his car.

That happened a couple of months ago, and it rolls around in my mind a lot. I wonder what kind of marriage they had. Who decided to end it? I wonder if she was always a bitch, or if she turned bitter because of something he did. I wonder at the discipline it took her to fake getting treatment when she was so sick. I wonder what she was punishing the EX husband for. I wonder why he took it, or if he ever fought back. I wonder if Miss Johnson is angry or desperate for attention. Would she take him back if he asked? Why was he the one to give her a ride to the clinic?

I wonder why I still worry about her.

An unfinished thought

Every human being on earth is three meals away from being an animal. If you are hungry enough, you will lie, cheat, steal, and kill to eat. You will kill to eradicate a perceived threat. You will kill to protect your family and friends. You can’t help it - it’s hardwired into your brain. Even the nicest animal rights activist is the pinnacle of her genetic line. Her ancestors have triumphed over disease, famine, and saber toothed tigers. Her ancestors have even triumphed over that most dangerous of animals – other humans. Sure, she can divorce herself a bit from her genetic heritage, but only if the present environment is cushy enough to allow the luxury of adopting a cause that runs counter to all that genetic conditioning.

I wish I could teach her that not every human tries to separate so hard from that heritage. She puts herself at a disadvantage by doing that. I'm sad for awhile after she gets taught that lesson. Since I'm a bit sad, I don’t mind when she bleeds on my scrubs. I’ll put a cool cloth on her forehead and bring her a piece of ice to suck on. It’s the little courtesies, you see, that separate me from the animals.

Internet Dating

I wrote this on a message board in response to a question about internet dating. It came out pretty good, so I'm putting it up here.




I've been on two internet dates. One ended with me getting hot tea poured deliberately into my lap, and the other one was a fucking disaster.

Several years ago, I went through a period of pretty low self esteem. I had just gotten out of the military and had a five year long relationship end on bad terms. I was adrift in life, and women could smell it on me. It was like I had a phantasmal neon sign above my head that read "Mid twenties male. Brash, annoying, desperate, clingy." There was no love out there for your faithful scribe.

I did what every idiot does at that point, which was to convince myself that if I could just get the right girl, everything would look up. The ladies were not so enthusiastic about my cart before the horseness. I turned to eHarmony to remedy this unfortunate situation.

After the month long vetting process, I finally arranged a date. The girl was a Mary Kay salesperson (make up ladies are hot, right?) and seemed to be about where I was in life. I drove over to her apartment to take her to dinner, visions of meeting my future wife playing in my head. I just knew that this would be The One - we were going to become a team and pull each other out of our collective funks, building each other's self esteem. Together, we were going to conquer the world.

I pulled up outside her building (she didn't give me her actual apartment number for PERSEC reasons) in the rain and called her. After she said she was coming out, I began watching for her. I am a gentleman and always open the door for a lady, but I wanted to stay in my warm dry truck as long as possible. After several false alarms, I heard a knock on my passenger side door. My finely tuned jungle sense had somehow missed the future love of my life walking across the parking lot.

I sprung into action, much chagrined. Had I messed up her first impression already? I hopped out, and went around to the passenger side door. The creature I beheld was nothing like the one that had danced in my mind on the trip over. There were no long, lean thighs. There was no feminine jawline, no perfect (but tastefully concealed) busom pushing through a sheer (but tasteful, you see?) blouse. Absent were soulful (but glinting with subtle mischief!) eyes.

I was looking at a human tub of shit. This poor girl had let herself go to the point of repulsiveness. She had two and a half chins, a pannus that hung to her knock-knees, and tiny, beady eyes that were permanently squinting due to the oppressive weight of facial fat. Dear Reader, I believe I actually took several steps back.

"Hi, Savage Henry! I'm so excited to meet you. Where are we going to eat?"

My mind raced. I had reservations at a five star restaurant. I was prepared to invest three or four hundred dollars on dinner with the vision in my head. There is no sense skimping on the woman who was to be my salvation, I had reasoned. But this? Hell no.

"I figured we could head over to The Macaroni Grill. They have pretty good food, I guess."

Quick thinking, right? Smooth, too. Not smooth or quick enough to back out of this date, though. I was bullied into opening the truck door by social convention, and my inability to be a total asshole to an obese girl.

Have you ever seen films of the paratroopers getting on planes prior to jumping into Normandy? Burdened by a hundred pounds of gear and parachute, those brave men struggled up the ladders into DC-3s, teetering on the threshold until they got a helpful shove from the man behind them. Watching this woman get into my truck was quite similar. She huffed and puffed, quivered and jiggled, and finally slopped herself into the passenger's seat. My huge Dodge truck with a 3/4 ton suspension groaned. When I got back on my side, I swear my truck had a ten degree list to starboard.

Walking in to the restaurant with her, I was as embarrassed as I have been since a very unfortunate incident in fourth grade. The men cast pitying looks at me, and the women were not much better. The servers looked at her greedily, knowing there was economic opportunity in a woman who obviously ate so much.

Dinner conversation was uncomfortable, until I struck upon an idea. I asked about her past relationships. If I wasn't going to get to know the future Mrs. Savage Henry, I could at least do anthropological research into the kind of man who sought a woman such as this. She was emboldened by my seeming interest in her.

"Oh, I don't date a lot. I was seeing this guy for awhile, but he cheated on me and gave me an STD."

"Oh..An STD?...So...uh...what did you get?" Like she had won a raffle or grab bag or something.

"I have genital warts. Don't worry, though - I get them frozen off and you won't catch anything. We can still have sex."

"...."

"I hope we do have sex later. I'm having a really good time with you. I promise it will be great." The last part was said with what I assume was a conspiratorial wink, but it looked like some adipose triggered facial tic.

"Okay." I said.

That was the final blow for me. At that point in my life, I might have sunk so low as to use this poor creature for sex, but the thought of warts on my unit put the kibosh on that. We sped through dinner, her surely thinking I was excited by the promise of wading through folds of Limburger scented chub in search of her diseased lady parts, and me wishing for an ejection seat instead of a booth.

When we pulled up in front of her apartment building after dinner, I made the usual excuses about being tired and having to work early in the morning.

"You'll call me, right?"

I envisioned her very own phantasmal neon sign spinning over her head. It read "Female, mid-twenties. Fat, boring, desperate, and a PERMANENT FUCKING STD."

I went home, deleted her number, and drank half a bottle of Jack.