Hi Nichole,
Reinvention is getting tough.
As you know my past career took a bad turn. It still exists but in a greatly fucked up fashion compared to the old days. I could go back to it but I would have to work much harder for way less money and still be at least as liable as ever. This, assuming of course, that I could get up to speed on all the new software designed to increase the production of bullshit reportage on a bullshit market place for a bullshit mortgage industry which still puts it’s best minds to work on finding new ways to bullshit the new bevy of bullshit regulatory agencies and side step the new bullshit regulations which in turn are designed to bullshit the citizenry into believing that the government is not bullshitting them when it says “we cannot allow this financial Titanic to sail again.” Well, I’m here to tell you, sail it will. Anyway, I just can’t seem to get motivated to stick my head back in the lion’s mouth, however, as the calendar pages fly off it is becoming increasingly apparent that I may, at the very least, have to set up business in the lion’s cage. I have some applications out. We’ll see.
Chris and I were reviewing a list of unsavory employment options, all of which are attached in some way or another to the mortgage lending industry, and sinking ever deeper into the rotting, reeking, swamp of disgust and hopelessness which so often accompanies this exercise when, like the fading of a hangover, it dawned on us. PERMANENT DISABILITY! At our age (57 and 60 respectively) this is not out of the realm of possibly and warranted at least a cursory investigation. We started to list our qualifications.
“Hell, I’m on anti-anxiety medication and have been for years. I have a long history of fruitless doctor visits and medical consultations all resulting in a single diagnosis. ‘You’re fuckin’ nuts, take it easy why don’t cha.’ That should account for something!” I exclaimed with more than a modicum of confidence.
“Shit, that’s nothin’” Chris said. I could picture him leaning back in his swivel chair, putting his feet on his desk and looking upwards through the ceiling to the sky above. “I’ve had two heart attacks, I got a pace maker, I’ve had a pernicious case of colitis for most of my life and I’m living with a second hand liver.”
“Lucky.” I said crumpling my resume and tossing it into the trash barrel.
At least we’ve done our part in helping the medical community stay afloat in these times of woe. Not that they need much help. With most of the population approaching, if not exceeding, my age (57) there is no shortage of potential patients. You go in for a physical and of course the primary care physician is going to find something that needs further testing. In my case I’m a sucker for tests due, in no small measure, to the fact that in the past eight years I have lost eight close friends to either cancer or heart ailments. The oldest of which was sixty three years old. So now if I get a hang nail I go up to Kathy (registered nurse for 25 years) and ask “hon, do I have finger nail cancer?”
“I don’t think so but maybe you should get some tests run just to be sure,” she says. “What a fuck nut.” she adds as she turns and walks into the living room.
So I start having all these panic symptoms due, I think, to the collapse of western civilization. I get all this incredible upper digestive track gas which causes my stomach to expand to the size of a dirigible which puts amazing pressure on my major artery going into my heart which cuts off the blood flow which mimics a heart attack which sends me to the doctors office. I tell my story. Doc says, “Let’s send you over to the cardiologist for some tests.” Three visits to the cardiologist and “everything appears alright” he says, “let’s send you to another heart specialist for more tests.”
“More special than you?” I ask as I put on my shirt.
“Look, just go to this other medical mall fifty miles from your house and see this doctor whose name I’ve written down here, show up at the time I’ve designated there, and don’t cause any trouble.” the heart specialist says, perturbed at my lack of respect for his level of specialness.
“K.” I acquiesce.
I schlep over to the medical mall, fifty miles from my house, and see the extra special specialist. Extra special specialist says, “You’ve got an extra wire in your heart. Causes confusion. Alls I gotta do is send this tube with these tiny scissors up this artery here, into your heart and snip that little sucker.”
“How often does this condition become fatally dangerous?” I ask, off handedly.
“Never.” answers the extra special specialist.
“How often is this procedure fatally dangerous?” I obviously continue.
“Oh, about two percent of the time.” extra special specialist shrugs.
“I’ll get back to you.” I say terminating the consultation.
I go back to primary doc’s office with a full report on my adventures in cardiology.
“Hmm, let’s go ahead and order an upper gastro-intestinal test. See what happens,” is his advice.
I go to the gastro-intestinal specialists, tell him my story, he says, “Forget the test, you’re gulping air.”
“What?”
“You get all tense and excited and you secretly gulp air. Blows your stomach up like a dirigible.”
“How many advanced degrees did you need to come up with that diagnosis?” I wonder silently.
I go home… “Kathy, the guy says I gulp air. That’s my whole issue, I gulp air. What the fuck?” I‘m incredulous.
“Well hell, I coulda told ya that. I see you do that shit all the time. You know, whenever you get all tense and excited and shit.” Kathy notes as she is putting groceries away.
So anyway, just last week, your grandma goes to the doctor for a check up. X-ray shows a tiny spot on her lung. Better run a cat scan. Cat scan shows a tiny spot on her lung. Better run a pet scan. Pet scan confirms that there is in fact a tiny spot on her lung. Hmm. Better get a biopsy. Four sections of tiny spot are taken. Biopsy is analyzed. All four samples indicate scar tissue, nothing more. Radiologist says, “we need a diagnosis, let’s do another biopsy.”
What the fuck!?
Your grandmother says, “Fuck that I’m going down to the Bird Cage and getting a drink.”
“What, da’ ya think I’m crazy!?” she mutters as she is leaving the radiology lab.
Oh ya, I’m going in for my bi-annual physical on Monday. You know, refresh my prescriptions, get a battery of blood tests, stuff like that.
Love dad
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