Jim Alf
Isolation with time on one’s hands is for the imaginative the Club Sega Arcade of mental games. It is a factory for fancies. It is the breeding ground for hopeless despair. In such situations thoughts formed whole from the detritus of splintered observations congeal into mirages too horrid to exist anywhere but the desert of phantasmal imagery. A favorite feeding ground for those thoughts is a buffet of bodily signs and symptoms.
My symptoms were few but signs were posted with regularity (remember that word) along the road to the most dangerous of destinations: self-diagnosis. That repeated sign was the gradual lack of need for the most hoarded, most fought over, decidedly topmost item on the list of civilized necessities in a pandemic of viral death threats: that soft, white squeezable roll of paper hung by the throne. That observation, with some unusual weight loss and lessened appetite morphed easily into dark suspicions of impending decline of health, surgery and debilitation and eventual memorial service with a bluegrass band playing I’ll Fly Away and friend’s maudlin recitations of what a jolly good fellow he was before he flew away. Morbid thought is like yeast, expanding beautifully but full of gaseous bubbles, an apt metaphor because that was my only production. Surely my primary physician would sound alarms, begin testing and schedule treatments, probably too late. She brushed me off.
I talked on the phone to the clinic receptionist, she passed me on to a nurse who noted my medical complaint and said she would talk to the doctor. I asked for a test kit by mail. I was certain such dire observations would result in a call from the doctor post haste. The nurse called. The doctor says if it gets worse call in a week. From the mortician’s? Hope evaporated like a rain drop in Death Valley.
Phone calls apprised next of kin, Powers of Attorney were reviewed, obituary was updated and plans for a dependent formed. What else was needed? Downsize now! Too late. Let the survivors do it. Hope Gospel can bring a truck. Then, what luck: I was notified my annual checkup at the VA was two days away and the doctor would call at 8 a.m. on Friday. Friday, the day of fish fries, baked potato, slaw and I didn’t dare eat. I could only hope that phone call would be in time. It was.
The call was three minutes early, fortuitous because every minute counted. I had my list of symptoms ready, BP and pulse taken. Fear billowed like a cloud. I recited my list. He asked if I had pain. No pain. Bloating? None. Itch all over? Never heard of it. “Drink plenty of prune juice,” he said.
I had an unopened jug in the fridge. Hope came in a tall glass, was purple, cold and tasty. Efficient, too. The treatment took ten minutes, a short time later the cure lasted ten more. The call to reserve a full order of fish, five minutes. Hope survives, banishes fear, lights the way. Life goes on.
Jim Alf is the author of When The Ferries Still Ran: History and Stories From the Chippewa Bottoms.