How in the hobs of hell did I land in this mess, listening to these two old farts going on about the new generation being worse than theirs? Wrinkly old prunes. She must be a terror at home. Look at that glint and those deep frown marks. Either she’s in pain or she is one and him. Ha! His head’s a bobbing like he’s got one at home just like her. Doubt they’re much older than me. Could be younger if they’re beach babies.

I’d had hoped for an empty waiting room and a quiet television set but no... I had to fall into the second level of hell. My leg throbbing from the wound that will not heal; my head aching from lack of sleep topped off by being a couple, not ten, not fifteen, no, just a couple of minutes late. The penalty my dear, you get to be bumped to the end of the line. So my entertainment for this morning is a blaring television that I can’t reach to shut off and a room full of magpies. And a Chatty Cathy doll whose string apparently has been pulled to the max. Maybe if I shut my eyes, they’ll all ignore me. I swear if that blathering old hen doesn’t make some sense real quick, I’m going to feed her a piece of my mind she ain’t going to want to eat.

Is this generation worse? Yeah, maybe. Maybe not. Or maybe we made it happen because we did things our way...yeah baby, there really wasn’t a more ‘me’ generation than us young adults in the sixties.

Have kids, haul them along, burn the bra. Yeah, burn that bra! While you’re at it, burn the girdle too. Must have been invented by a man. A sadist son of a bitch at that. I’d like to see a guy wear a binder in place of a jock strap. Wow. Now, that’s an image! Bet it’d hurt like that flippin’ girdle... Gotta laugh when some gal asked where the fat went from her stomach and I told her to look in her bra, and she did. Airheads then, airheads now.

Free love. No such thing as free love. Too many consequences. Didn’t take the chances offered even when Hal was a pain in the butt. Thought about it. Fancied it but Nah, too much trouble down the line. Besides my vows said ‘For better or worse’ and ‘til death do ye part.’ Thought of killing him a couple of times though. Ha! Never would have gotten away with that.

Didn’t really think too much of the flag burning demos, though. And what about those kids getting killed at Kent State done by my folks’ generation. Sure, it was nervous kids in the Guard that pulled the triggers but it was the ones in charge that ordered the suppression. That generation wasn’t too hot either, if you take the stuff they did, like killing King or the Kennedy men.

I felt my heart rip in two when King was killed. We’d just found our puppy dead, been fed rat poison, the vet said. The world has some serious sicko’s running loose. She’d done her job warning us when that thief tried to steal the deer carcass. Got to pay with her life. And King, preaching peace. Peace! Paid with his life, too. Buried them both the same day. The heavens wept with us.

Bobby was a promise of reform his brother tried to start, but corruption took him out. Get to share our anniversary with his death. Another stab in the heart. Felt frozen with grief. What an awful decade. What a stain on our nation.

I can’t believe she’s still nattering on, extolling the virtues of our generation. Smell the coffee Lady - it’s burnt; fit only to douse your ardor!

Or good God... the generation before that! Hitler and his buddies. Evil incarnate. And everyone asleep at the wheel letting him get a toe-hold. Turning a blind eye because it wasn’t them that got tagged for death. Remember in youthful passion, asking my boss’ wife how they could let that happen? She said, “We were afraid.” Ended up consoling her in her grief. She was just a child in those years herself. And then, years later consoling another woman, a child of a holocaust victim. Such utter evil pain!

“Hey Lady, what are we doing today to stop the atrocities all around us?,” I wanted to shout, but didn’t. Hal’s pulled me away from too many arguments on stupidity. Bigotry, that’s what it comes down to. He’s not here, so better just keep my mouth shut. He was my damper, a control I still apparently need. Damn, wish I could plug my ears.

Grandma said the Catholic Church was going to hell in a hand-basket when they started eating meat on Friday. She’d probably think that today’s society hand-basket had wheels without a brake. Could be.

Seems like either no discipline and the kids are running wild or our kids are harming their kids and getting away with it. This political correctness crap goes way too far. Lip service and typecasting, not taking into account individuality. Being glad some government agency is going to take care of this or that, never thinking it won’t happen. And that’s just it. It doesn’t happen.

The cops won’t take a complaint from a kid that looks like the stripes and stars because it’s a domestic problem, they say. Go to the hospital, they say. These doctors, what do they say? Take it to Child Protection Services. Ha! What a laugh that is if it weren’t so sad these kids are getting maimed, killed, and the evil going free.

But is it worse? Weren’t there sweatshops with kid labor at the turn of last century? Just a little over a hundred years, not much time at all. Weren’t kids considered chattel, could be beaten to death, just like some women still are today? Different cultures but good Lord, enough is enough! The bad thing is most of society wants to live in peace. Wants to love and respect but hate festers and grows and mankind seeks the low road. Turning the other cheek has become lip service. But this seems to be a thread running through the centuries.

Lord, I want to thank you for not having me born in a culture that thinks their donkey is worth more than their girl children. With my mouth, I would have been stoned before I reached ten. I’m finding it hard not to be judgmental listening to the pap flowing between these two oldsters who apparently grew up in a bubble. Or, maybe it was a cloud of smoke.

My own mother was born right after the so-called war to end all wars. Sure it was. But not in this reality. Looking for saviors, but getting dictators like Mussolini and Stalin, then Hitler. I slid out in time for the Korean War. These S.O.B.’s get their backing from the hopeful, the weary, the apathetic. Society blinded to the silver tongue lies of a charismatic speaker. Is today much different?

Turf wars between the gangsters escalating with ‘booze’ as big business. Only the illegal businessman had the wealth. No Dow and Jones for that crew. Smith and Wesson were the familiar. Today’s weapons, the semi-auto or the machete and rape! Faces, drugs, weapons change but motives and hate ride the waves from generation to generation, a curse on society.

And the ‘great’ depression - hell the only thing great about it was the vastness of the people brought to their knees. Our economy today being sold down the river of profits for the few. Where’s the difference when the bottom line is the same?

It’s not even 'have and have not'. It’s the total apathy toward the helping hand. Not so much reaching down as there is reaching up. This battlefield needs to be leveled. 

 

Unfortunately, it is, but in the wrong direction. The middle class has joined the ranks of the working poor and the fat cats are ready to pop. Not that there isn’t good and generous rich. There are. It’s just they are getting harder to find.

One more down, two more to go and then maybe Chatty Cathy will break up this tongue fest. Or maybe I wouldn’t be so cranky if I had more sleep but I’ve got hubby living two lives, one day, one night, dreaming on his feet, keeping me running. Probably look like I’ve got a hangover. Can’t even read with this headache.

Geesh! Now she’s working on her grandkids. Sounds like they’re wise little buggers. Wise asses, according to her. Well if she finds fault with them to their face as easily as she’s going on here, can’t say I blame them for not visiting more often.

Finished with the kids so now we’re onto that newfangled internet. The face thingy. Facebook woman, Facebook! Probably had one of her kids...yup, you did, didn’t ya. ‘Come on face thingy mom, then we can keep in touch.’ Hope she wakes up and takes her kid’s invitation.

Poking her head into the waiting room, Shari says, “Thomas. Thomas Lee. The doctor will see you now. Louise, you’re next, dear.”

After nodding my head and smiling, I again shut out the room by closing my eyes, returning to my thoughts.

I’m next. Great. That means half an hour or so. I guess one of the birds escaped from this cage flying home, me being next. Chatty Cathy has gone mum since Thomas went in to wait alone, the next step in this dance; it’ll be ten, fifteen minutes before he actually gets to see the doctor.

Now if we could do the same to the television. I’ve been here close to two hours. If they really want to keep the patients in the dark about time frittering away, just not having a clock isn’t going to do it. No Television would seal the deal. Hell, there's been four shows on since I showed up. Guess they figure with the soaps, no one’s going to notice. Faugh!

Maybe I can do a power nap if I tune out the telly. Yeah. Right. Got to replace the noise with some inner noise. Drifting isn’t going to happen. Wonder where Karen is? Shari is an okay kid but walks like she’s in a marathon. Forgets she’s dealing with the old and infirm. And today, the cranky.

“Louise. Louise. Mrs. Case! Wake up!” I abruptly awaken to Shari shaking my shoulder and yelling in my ear.

“I’m not deaf! No need to yell!” Realizing I just yelled at her, I mutter, “Sorry, I was asleep and I don’t wake up cheery.” These kids think if you’re white on the roof, the chimneys are plugged.

“The doctor’s ready for you now. Come with me,” she says. No please, thank you, or kiss my butt, just ...Come with me!

I slowly get to my feet, the wound chafing in the boot that’s become a fashion accessory because the foot is still fractured. I gingerly hobble down the hall, noting the doorway she has entered. Walking in, I see her fussily arranging the paper barrier on the chair that is too high for me to easily slide onto. This is the room I detest. It’s bad enough I get to sit in a cold sterile room waiting for the doctor to show up, but now I first get to climb Mt. Everest and this one gets huffy if I ask for the stool. Well today, she can huff.

“Shari, sweetie. I need the stool to get into this chair.”

Scanning the room as if the stool will magically appear within this ten-foot square, Shari grunts, “Humph! I don’t know where it is.” But after looking at my raised eyebrow, she grumbles, “I’ll go look for it.” and adds sarcastically, “Make yourself comfortable.”

I wonder if Shari is the one Chatty Cathy thinks about when she’s putting down the whole new generation? She’s a good model. Ah, here comes Miss Congeniality now, dragging the stool behind her. Lovely. Scuff marks. Bet the custodians love her too.

“Here ya go,” she says as she slams the stool down and turns to leave the room.

“Er, Shari, dearest! It seems I’ll be needing your help to steady the stool.”

She stops and spins around, closing the gap between us quickly. She grasps the handle in the style of a Toreador with a cape, sighs and says, “Okay, then! Hop on!”

I want to yell at her, “Look at my foot, you silly bitch. Hop? How high do you think I can hop, dearie?” But I don’t. I just let the sound of silence show my displeasure. There are patients resting in the room across the hall and they don’t need my anger at this insensitive clod spilling into their ears. Got to wonder why this gal is a nurse. Not a compassionate bone in this reedy body; better suited for mannequin strutting, I’d imagine.

It’s not easy climbing the stool. The leg with the wound and boot is my strong leg while the left is useless when pushing down to go up, so I must put the heel of the boot onto the stool, grab the bar, sharing the handle space with the nurse from hell, and swivel my butt onto the chair. Not too hard when you know each step to make it happen and you get cooperation from a steadying hand. I warn her I will be clasping onto the handle so she moves her hand to the side allowing the room. Another sigh punctuates the silence.

My adjusting scrunches the paper but does not totally dislodge it. Again I cock my eyebrow at her. She is showing her displeasure with a frown. Well, what does she expect? That I’ll hover an inch off the pad thus leaving it pristine? I smile. She frowns harder. I chuckle. She leaves. Works like a charm. Now she can go dribble her displeasure on someone else.

This chair has its back too far away to get comfortable. And I’m too short to recline. The top of my head would poke it, then I’d have a pain in my neck. Ha! I could shut my eyes and pray I don’t pitch forward. That would be the ticket. Get rid of a headache with a face-plant on the tiles. Right. Better not. I already look like the walking wounded. And the poor custodian would have a bigger mess to clean up.

Wonder which miracle worker I’ll get today. Dr. Optimistic or Dr. Doom. Dr. D and Shari make a good pair. She tees them up and he knocks them out.. and off. I always seem to get him when I’m cranky. He’s like the reward for my attitude.

Dr.O steps in to tell me Dr. D will be along shortly and trots off before I can say, "That is really just peachy keen. I wouldn’t think of leaving." I can’t get off this flipping chair!

When he finally sails into my frigid holding cell, Karen in tow, there are no hellos from Dr. D, just “Let’s see if this wound has healed any better.” Then to the one bright sight in the room, Karen, he turns and rapidly shoots off instructions on what he needs and how he needs it to deal with this pesky, slow healing wound.

And then he’s back to me with questions, ”Have you given any thought to what we discussed last week? Are you going to do what I said?”

Knowing exactly what he is talking about but unwilling to give in to this little Hitler, I ask, “What would that be Dr. Dixon?”

A big sigh, one that rivals Shari’s and would have her bursting with pride on hearing, he mutters, “Pain in the ass.”

“Excuse me, Dr. D. Did you just say, … can’t let this pass?”

“No, no, Mrs. Case. Just thinking aloud. I’m wondering if you have thought about placing your husband in a nursing home as I suggested?”

“No.”

Another sigh escapes before he grittily asks, “Is that no you didn’t think about it? Or no you won’t do it?”

“Both.”

“You realize you won’t ever heal if your stress load is not lightened. Putting your husband in a home would greatly reduce your stress. You’d get the sleep you obviously need. And then, your bones will knit quickly and your wound will disappear in no time.”

“How old are you Dr. Dixon, if I might be so bold to ask? Forty-five? Fifty?”

“I’m thirty-seven!”

“Really? Your stress load must be heavy because you do truly look to be between forty-five and fifty. My wound will heal, my bone will knit. It takes time and when and if you make it to my age, you will understand acceptance. Things you can change you do, things you cannot, you accept. Do you want to ask me that question again?”

“No. You obviously have your mind made up, so I’ll not waste my time. Karen, finish up here and make an appointment for Mrs. Case for next week,” he says, making a hasty retreat. Coward!

“I’m sorry Mrs. Case but Dr. Dixon sometimes is a bit overzealous. He’s also a tiny bit on the vain side and I truly think you offended him with your observations on his age.”

“I probably would have let his question go with a wink and a shrug as I have for the past month, but, he was right, I do need more sleep. I am cranky. I was listening to an oldster earlier on how the younger generation needs handling and then ending the appointment with a relatively young man who thinks the oldsters should be handled. It’s ironic. They cancel one another out.”

 

Imprint

Text: 3000 word story
Publication Date: 11-09-2011

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
for the ones in society that feel their age is the only viable one