Fancy Meeting You Here

The next day a pompous, round doctor showed up in the room in the morning.  "Mr. Roszel, I'll be doing your surgery this evening.  It should be routine. I will be placing a port in an artery in your chest to make it easier for you to receive chemo. I need you to sign the consent."  Rick stared at him blankly.

Why is it that I am invisible?  What part of "My husband is not on the planet Earth." doesn't he get?

"I'm Mrs. Roszel.  He's quite drugged up and won't remember that you were here in five minutes".  I got a dirty look and he continued to talk to Rick.  I let him go on.  

There's no sense rockin' the boat if he'll be the one with the knife.

Later that day, a small, handsome man in purple scrubs walked into the room.  There was something familiar about him but I couldn't place him.  "I know you." he said with his two hands out at his side.  Then it hit me! "Intimately," I said.  He cocked his head to the side with a puzzled look.

This was Dr. Hassan; I had seen him when I was nine months pregnant and suffering from hemorrhoids.  I was an enormous, desperate woman.  A male nurse and Dr. Hassan had performed a minor surgery to remove 5 blood clots that were causing me excruciating pain. You have to know how much pain I was in; the thought of two men working on a beached whale was not my idea of a good time.

In the middle of the procedure the two of them burst out laughing.  I couldn't imagine what could be so funny. "You two better not be laughing at my butt!" I said in a gruff voice. "Oh, Mrs. Roszel the doctor's stomach growled: he hasn't had lunch yet.  It wasn't you. We're so sorry."  They continued to laugh.

Dr. Hassan came in the hospital room and gave me a hug and told me that he would be doing Rick's surgery.  "But another doctor came in."  I told him.  "No, he's sick; I'll be doing it." siad Dr. Hassan looking at me.  Rick was sleeping.  I told him how drugged up he was.  "Don't worry about it.  I'll take good care of him."  he told me.  "It will be okay." "I'll meet you in the lobby following the surgery and let you know how it went.  Hang in there." he said.

It's odd how one man's presence can knock all the sticks down and another, just with his tenderness and understanding, can lay them all straight, at least for a little while.