JUSTICE ALL AROUND
"You
look tired," the nonagenarian mentioned midway
into her fourth yarn of a tale.
"Oh
no, I'm fine," I said trying to discreetly
shake circulation back into my leg.
"So
I have pneumonia? But I wasn't coughing," the
91 year old stated boldly.
"You're
ninety-one, you won't always have the usual sympt-"
I started.
"SHH!"
her eyes widened, "I don't want people
to know I'm that old."
Oh…
kay.
The
real problem with the elderly is that they have so many
stories to tell, but sometimes lack the memory to remember they told
it.
So they tell it again. And again.
"...I
know, you told me about that already (twice just
minutes ago). I really think we need to try to focus a
bi-" I interrupted only to be
interrupted again.
"I
think someone needs to be a little more
patient," she said.
Sigh.
And so on.
"It's
a good thing I had my cellphone on me after I
passed out," Ol' Spirit of '91 said.
I
wondered if cellphones put those LifeCall things out of
business.
"You
could buy one of those ropes around your neck ...
to wear your cellphone," the first part of that didn't come out quite
the
way I meant. Or did it?
"You
know, I did the very first commercials for those a
few years back."
"Really?"
"I
wasn't the I've Fallen And I Can't Get Up Lady but
it was close. I also was in a few Zam B_rnstein commercials."
"Wow,"
despite the fact that this B_rnstein
character is one of the most nefarious pandering opportunistic
ma1practice
vultures around, I was genuinely impressed. He's one of those 1awyers
who make
commercials like "Do you have [insert any disease with a difficult
diagnosis here]? Call Z-A-M." Amy
actually saw him looking for business once in the trauma/burn ICU back
in
nursing school.
"Were
you an actress?"
"No,
no. But I did win a few beauty contests when I was
younger. Not that you can tell anymore. ... Did you know that Zam
B_rnstein
spends over a million dollars on advertising," the old lady rolled her
eyes and continued,
"And
do you know I didn't get paid a cent?"
"No
way."
"He
doesn't tell you that beforehand. No contracts. But I did two
30-second spots for him, and all I got was a copy of the tape. Now is
that
cheap or what?"
"Unbelievable."
"With
all that money he makes and believe me young man,
he's rolling in it, he wouldn't even pay an old lady in his commercial. It waited for three hours on the set."
Three
hours is a lot of time when you're in your golden
years, or hours, depending.
"I'll
never work for him again."
_______________________________________
LAST SCENES AND END STAGES
(Or How To End Any Argument In 10 Seconds)
"She
was just here two weeks ago for the same thing.
And now her belly is filled up or whatever you people call it all over
again," the angry husband vented to me in the hospital.
"He
doesn't care," the middle-aged woman with
liver failure and an abdomen the size of a 10-month pregnancy said of
doctors
in general, and me in particular.
"Whatever
they gave her last time isn't working and I
want this fixed this time," angry husband said again.
As
he continued to rant, I realized how unrealistic their
expectations were. Not long after, I
realized they had no idea what they were dealing with as far as her
condition.
"You
know she has end stage liver disease right? Your
belly swelling up every two weeks despite your medications is telling
you that
your liver is not working. At all. This is end stage. The medicines will not
fix this. The average life expectancy of someone in your condition is
about
six to twelve months," I said stopping their runaway train of fury like
a cartoon mountain with a painted on tunnel opening.
Nothing
stops an unpleasant conversation like telling
someone they have less than a year to live.
After
some gentler words, she said,
"Thank
you for telling me."
A
couple days later, she even said,
“Thanks
for trying.”
(The
husband got it in his brain that he would have to get her a liver
transplant. I didn't have the heart to tell him they don't give livers
to
alcoholics. There just aren't that many to go around.
_______________________________________
STRANGER THAN YOUR SYMPATHY
You
can pretty much classify hospital patients into four
categories.
Category
I: There's
the ones you make better.
Category
II: Then
there's the ones you make better, for now, until next time. And there will be a next time.
Category
III: The
ones you can't help very much at all, even for now.
Category
IV: And then
there's the ones that die.
I
don't talk about the first category much. They come in,
you treat them for a few days, they go out. They're fine, so you forget
about
them. When they leave they smile and
joke, "No offense, you've been great, but I hope I never see you again.
At
least not in a hospital."
The
second category is also very common. This would be like
the cirrhotic lady above or the stroked-out nursing home grannies who
get
pneumonia after pneumonia. They are the
Frequent Fliers.
Category
III are usually on their way to Category IV. My
twenty-year old with the untreatable brain tumor is in this category.
The
surgeons can't touch her. Radiation
almost killed her.
Each
day I check up on her and like everyone else, have
nothing to offer her. Yet, she still calls
me "My Favorite Doctor."
I don't know why it
always has to be like that.
_______________________________________
CONFESSION SESSION
1. You know, in the seven years
I've been making those little red line breaks like the one above and
below, I've never standardized them. Every single line is
probably a different length. I should change that.
I feel better now.
_______________________________________
L. L. ... The LIGER!
(as in Ladies Love The LIGER!)
The lovely hapa hottie Lisa, sent me a picture of her own
cat*, who is currently in heat over ... The LIGER!
At least someone loves ... The LIGER! around here.
* I would like it
noted for the record, that I did not take the cheap joke
route here and use the word
"pussy" in place of "cat." Fatherhood
has indeed matured me.
Come to think of it, I used to put pictures of fine cuties, booties,
and boobies at the end of my entries.
I'm glad I've finally matured to pussies now.
