Relief

 Look- doctors can do better with their offices and exam rooms. They just could. I am aware, however, that I don't even have the slightest clue as to what it costs to operate a medical office. It makes me feel ill, just thinking about it. I mean- from the little cups to pee in for urine samples to- well- whatever the most expensive thing they use is. Plus staff salaries and cleaning costs, rent to mortgages. It must be never-ending. Throw in the fact that most doctors graduating from med school owe a shit-ton of money in loans and I don't know how anyone manages to get up and running in business for themselves, even if they belong to a group. 
So I guess I have to give them grace. There was a very large photo/picture on the wall beside where I was sitting of a beach at sunset, taken on the level of the tops of sea oats which was a fine picture but I wasn't facing it. Plus, the exam room was freezing. FREEZING. I finally rustled around in the drawers of the exam table and found a towel that I wrapped around me like a shawl. There was a pretty good wait to see the always interesting Doctor Zorn today but I never get too upset about that. I know how much time he spends with me and every patient deserves that. 

When he finally gave the door a knock and came in, he crossed the room and hugged me. 
Just saying that makes me want to cry. I've never before had a doctor like that. We talked about what you might call medically related things for a few minutes. He asked me how I was doing and I said, "Pretty darn okay!" and he said, "Well, I'll take that."
We discussed the weight loss and how that has affected me and he praised me for it, said I looked good and I told him I felt so much better. He could tell. Anyone could tell. 
He said my bloodwork was fine and that was all I needed to know about that. And then we started talking about...books! 
You want to hear something sweet? His daddy, who was also a doctor, read to him every day for at least ten minutes until he was a senior in high school. And he loves to read now. Which of course I do too, and we got started, throwing titles around. "Have you read this?" "Have you read that?" He wrote down the names of two books I recommended, one being The Yearling, the other being Keith Richard's Life. The Yearling came up when he mentioned how much he loves to grow field peas and black-eyed peas and zipper peas and how it's so amazing to think of all the people who have sustained lives on those things which of course led me to talk about how Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings described those very people. Then he got to talking about a biography of George Washington he'd read that was full of information that they do not teach you in school such is that George, a devout teetotaler who could not abide the drinking of alcohol around him could not make a damn cent on his giant plantation until they started making corn whiskey at which point his coffers grew and his disdain of the devil's lemonade lessened. 
And then of course I had to bring up Life, telling him not only was it my favorite memoir I've ever read, it is truly one of the best books I've ever read. 
"Really?!" he said. 
"Yes!" And he wrote it down along with The Yearling. 
He also wrote down "rattlesnake beans." He asked me about pressure canning and says he wants to learn how to do it. He even asked me a few questions about it such as what kind of canner do I use? Did I blanch the beans before they went into the canner? Do you sterilize the jars first?
In other words, he has some knowledge of this and wasn't just making nice. 
And how often have you ever been in a doctor's office where they asked YOU for suggestions and information? 

He did his magic trick and got me up on the table without me realizing it and then he took my blood pressure again as he always does because when the tech takes it, it's sky high but after he and I have visited for awhile it's fine, and he looked into my ears and throat and listened to my heart and my lungs and gave my legs and ankles and feet a quick going over and proclaimed me to be fine. 

I scooted back to my chair and we talked another minute or so and then he gave me another hug, told me to call if I needed them, and that was that. 
And when I made an appointment for six months from now, I did not have the stones-in-my-gut feeling, the pre-anxiety about the anxiety I would be experiencing in half a year. 

It could not have gone any better. 

And after that, I did a quick shopping at Publix and then met up with Jessie and August and Levon for lunch and then a quick thrift store run. The boys got a few things and Jessie got a nice bag and I got to spend time with those sweeties. There wasn't one thing in the store I cared enough about to bring home but there was this.

It was probably about 2 inches by three and a half inches and it's just a cheap little tacky Florida souvenir but I sort of wish I'd bought it to bring home and put on the shelf above the sink in my bathroom. The easel is plastic and if it had been wood, I would own it now. If I'm back down that way soon I might pick it up. 

So it was a good day for me. A day in which yes, I did take half of an Ativan but they're so old that there may be naught but the placebo effect left in them. And once sweet Dr. Z. showed up, no anti-anxiety meds were needed. 
A very cool thing that happened was that when I was in the waiting room, someone called my name and I looked up to see two of my old dear friends whom I used to play with at the Monticello Opera House back when Kathleen was alive. Kathleen introduced me to them, in fact. And it was one of them who had recommended Dr. Z to me in the first place. 
"You really, really like him?" I'd asked. I was desperate to find a doctor who would listen to me, who could calm my fears. 
"Well, let me put it this way," she said. "I'm a lesbian and I would have his baby."
I'm pretty sure she wasn't serious but I got what she was saying. And she was right. Another friend of mine, a trans woman, recommended him highly too. 
All right. I didn't need a burning bush to guide me to his office. And now almost our entire family goes to him. 

It's been another day with a distinct lack of pictures. I did take this one after I found it in the garden.

Does that cucumber look stressed to you? It surely does not to me. In my eyes, it appears not to have a worry in the world. 
We should all be so lucky. 

See you tomorrow.

Love...Ms. Moon