It’s scary becoming suddenly senior. Especially when you hear those words, “Time for a colonoscopy.” It’s bad enough going to the dentist for crowns and a root canal let alone probe a persons plumbing system.
To begin, I thought I was going to be absorbing a killer tropical drink, killer being the key word here. Nothing like gulping a gallon of gag inducing Insta-Flo to irrigate the innards. I raced to the bathroom more times than the set records of Seabiscuit with my exceedingly sore bum. Then I reported for duty near dawn, starving to death and without my caffeinated jumpstart. They made me strip naked and robe myself in a drafty covering, definitely not a Calvin Klein creation, with those non-slippery socks. And I had just gotten a pedicure for the occasion. It was cold enough to have icicles forming from my bed rails, which had me skeptical that there may be a morgue attached to that unit for the soon-to-be departed.
The attendees kept reassuring me that after surgery, plenty of flatulence was totally acceptable in the confines of the surgical unit. I asked, “Then why are you wearing gas masks?” They proceeded to explain the procedure. So basically the enterologist would be prodding me with a fiber optic endoscopic camera for his viewing pleasure, and I would be the inhibited but fabulous benefactor who agreed to abstain from the usual honey muffins and margaritas for a mere 24 hours and counting. They referred to the instrument as the kaleidoscope, which is derived from the ancient Greeks, hence referred to as the observer of beautiful forms. Doubtful.
My insides resembled a used inner tube quite possibly subjected to a range of diseases, infections, chemical imbalances, poisonous bad habits, all lined with a prune like paneling.
They loaded me up on three medications mind you, as if I were going in for open heart surgery or a voluntary coma. With fingers crossed, a few knocks on wood, candles lit in the church sanctuary, last rites, and a hand over the Bible pleading for forgiveness for all my sins if the big man lets me live, I was placed on the butchers block. I didn’t want an eternity pass to the pearly gates quite yet, even with the evil horned one luring me south, and they told me to quit singing “Knock knock knockin’ on heaven’s door.” My dissector said, “No worries, it’s a very simple procedure.” The daring speciman that I am was needled and narcotized into insensitivity. A single bullet through the middle of the forehead would have sufficed. The last words I remember speaking were, “Go right ahead Doc, just try not to reach the north pole!”
I woke in what seemed like minutes later extremely groggy and feeling about as pretty as a gutted turkey. The forceful prep assistant told me to get dressed when all I wanted to do was sleep it off, say into the next century. She also told me that I had a muscle spasm and that I would have to have the procedure done all over again. I said, “I don’t mean to put a strain on our relationship, but #@^*$^*$$$$$???!!!!!!!!! ….. using all possible profanity available. How do I know that my specialist was lacking in tunnel vision and decided to take a coffee and Danish break mid-examination, propagating that lame excuse? That “what you don’t know won’t hurt you” speculation is pure poppycock. It’s more like, “what you hear is what you get!”
Not diminishing the staff’s reliability to get the job done, and done right, I’m highly unlikely to return without holding the physician at gunpoint and getting full promise of services rendered with a fabulous prognosis. I don’t want to have to perform my own assotomy just because a quack has the sacred time-allocated doctorly tradition of screwing up.
It was only by coincidence that while fleeing the scene, the lobby speakers were playing Dave Clark Five’s, Catch Me If You Can.