Some Things Cannot Be Unseen

It was just a routine Tuesday at the oncologist.  Larry and I headed back to the chemo lab and sat in two of the empty chairs.  Across from me was a new patient, an older woman.  I checked her out while I was waiting for them to get my mediport ready for chemo.

White haired, I placed her age as late seventies. She was wearing a housecoat, the kind that was popular at one point in the seventies, white with little flowers on it and the snaps running up the front.  It gave me pause to see that housecoat, since I equate such outfits with jammies or other things that you wear around the house but never in public.  Most of the people we'd seen at chemo were dressed in their every day clothes.  I myself usually wear loose fitting pants with a V-necked shirt for easy access to the mediport.   No fuss, but certainly not jammies.

So the housecoat stood out, but the lady was otherwise unremarkable as she sat there sound asleep, a blanket covering her upper body.  She snored a little, but that's pretty common in the chemo lab, too. Because I like to create stories in my head, I hypothesized that this lovely woman likely lived in assisted living, and the facility had brought her over.  Then the nurse got busy inserting the needle into my mediport and I had to focus on that.

Not because it hurts.  They have this wonderful numbing spray that anesthetizes the area around the mediport, so when the needle breaks the skin, all you feel is a little pressure.  And not because of my historically obnoxious needle phobia, either.   No, I had to focus because when they start to pull blood into the tube...sometimes nothing comes out.  That freaks me out a bit, and I have to focus on not completely losing what tiny bit of sanity that I have left.  There's a perfectly logical explanation for the lack of blood, and that is because the needle did not go where it was supposed to.  I know this, but I still freak out when it happens. Larry is no help, because his needle phobia is worse than mine. By the time I was hooked up and had the IV running, the lady across from me was awake.  I smiled at her, and she smiled back. 

And then she decided that she wanted to recline.  She pushed and pushed and pushed, but like most of us, her strength was limited. Larry and I watched; it would be a violation of chemo etiquette to offer unrequested help.  Finally, one of the nurses came over and helped recline the chair, and everything got quiet again.  Larry started answering emails on his phone, and I got a magazine from the table next to my chair.  Before I started to read I looked up at the newcomer.  She was directly across from me, her feet up, her legs slightly spread.  Right at my eye level.

It was a bad day for me to be a short woman. 

The housecoat was apparently all this lady was wearing for her chemo appointment. It took a moment for my brain to fully comprehend the horror that was right in front of me. This elderly lady, who looked like a stereotypical grandma, wasn't wearing underpants!  My eyes protested vociferously this visual invasion.  It was all I could do not to throw my hands up over my face and scream. I got flashed by Grandma. 

My first instinct was to grab my husband's arm and share my torment, but I managed to smother that thought with a coughing fit.

"You okay?"  Larry asked.  I merely nodded, my eyes watering.  He didn't need to share in my pain.

I decided the better course of action would be to pretend that I saw not a thing. Deep breaths, I told myself.  Take deep breaths, and try to forget.  That's it... Just shove that retina-burning image right down there in the dark with that one night in Nuevo Laredo when I did drink the water.   I  buried my face in an old magazine, until I calmed down.

I do not think that this woman was showing off her hooha on purpose; I just happened to be looking in the wrong place at the wrong time.  It was an unhappy accident, at least for me.  She did speak to me later.  I was polite, and we traded medical information regarding our cancers, just like I have done with all the other patients.  When I see her next time, I'll pretend that it never happened. 

But some things just cannot be unseen. 

This Post Has No Title

Today’s going to be free writing. Feel free to write for five minutes about anything or nothing. Dump your brain. Go back to basics and let it be a true Stream of Consciousness post. I can’t wait to read what’s going on in your head…


Today it was all about the soccer. Zane had his first game this morning bright and early.  Except that it was neither bright nor all that early.  It was cloudy and cold and windy is what it was.  I should have known, considering that Friday's USA game in Colorado was played during a snowstorm.  Larry thought that it was a blizzard, but I pointed out that during a blizzard, all you would see on the television would be white.  Honestly, I felt bad for those poor Costa Ricans--not only did they lose the game, they froze their butts off.  Do they even have snow in Costa Rica?  I know that it is a place that a number of seniors are retiring to live out their days, but I'm not sure about much else.  I suppose that I need to break out the atlas.  Do they even make atlases anymore?

I'm still not exactly sure how I feel about my grandmother dying on Friday.  I'm sort of sad, but also relieved, and then I feel guilty about that.  She had dementia, caused by tiny strokes; nobody knows for sure when those started, but they took her away bit by bit.  My grandmother forgot me a long time ago.  She was the grandparent I spent the most time with growing up; my grandpa was always out working on the farm.  My dad's mom was gone before I was even born and his dad died in 1976.  So Grandma and I spent time together whenever we visited, which was every other summer when we weren't overseas.  Grandma was always trying to lose weight, so often we would walk up and down the gravel roads around the farm.  Her hair was cut short, and when she washed it, she would put it in pin curls using lots of hairpins.  She would say that she never put salt on any food, but I would watch her pour it in the cooking pot by the fistful.  She did not like snakes.  She kept the hideous afghan that I crocheted for her; my mother got it back when they sold the farm and everything on it.

She used to have a Mickey Mouse tea set from the 1930s that she played with as a child.  I played with it when I was a child.  That tea set was supposed to come to me, but one of my aunts took it, and I don't expect to ever see it again, except in my memory.  That's where I'll see my Grandma, and I'll remember her as she was before the dementia. 


This was my 5 minute Stream of Consciousness Sunday post. It’s five minutes of your time and a brain dump. Want to try it? Here are the rules…

• Set a timer and write for 5 minutes.
• Write an intro to the post if you want but don’t edit the post. No proofreading or spellchecking. This is writing in the raw.
• Publish it somewhere. Anywhere. The back door to your blog if you want. But make it accessible.
• Add the Stream of Consciousness Sunday badge to your post (in the sidebar). .
• Link up your post below.
• Visit your fellow bloggers and show some love.