The speaker: Author Wade Rouse. The Subject: Humor, heartbreak and finding your voice as a writer. The challenge: Write about something you're afraid of. You have 20 minutes.
So...here's a slightly edited and cleaned up version of what resulted, in my notebook at least.
I am a veterinarian. In the course of my work, I've drawn blood from unhappy horses (and no horse is happy to donate blood); castrated calves restrained by two burly - and rather nervous - convicts at an Ohio correctional facility; wrestled reluctant Rottweilers and even managed to coerce belligerent clients to pay their bills. All in a day's work.
Despite resolving any number of virtually unimaginable messes and being covered at one time or another by most forms of yitz, gunk and spoo that animals are capable of producing, I'm ashamed to admit that I'm still grossed out by sick people.
The smells, sights and sounds of hospitals and nursing homes make my skin crawl. A client once raised her shirt in my clinic to ask my advice on whether or not her ten-day post-op mastectomy scars looked "normal" and I felt my innards backflip and try to force their way out my left nostril. My husband complains of an upset stomach and I shove two dog nausea pills and a cold washcloth through a crack in the bathroom door and whisper "call me if you need me," hoping desperately that he won't. And being childless, I have managed to sidestep the rivers of snot and midnight projectile vomiting episodes that I am told Moms are privileged to behold. And I haven't missed it a bit.
But as I am an only child living next door to a 90-year-old mother I've known for a long time that the day was coming when I'd have to square my shoulders, hike up my riding breeches and perform one of those corporal works of mercy the nuns told us we'd have to do in order to gain admission to our happily-ever-afterlife.
It happened just the other day, in fact. My fragile but feisty 90 year old mother shit her drawers.
She'd taken a laxitive, you see, and realized - too late - that she lacked the speed and strength with which to make it to the bathroom in a timely manner.
Fortunately for her, I was sitting on her living room couch, so when her response to my query "are you all right?" was a faint "no, I'm really sick," I shot off the couch, mentally bracing myself to face the inevitable, and hustled to her rescue.
I helped her to the bed and washed her off, then brought her clean clothes and tidied up the bathroom. Although grateful, she was also understandibly embarassed by this (hopefully temporarily) loss of dignity, and I think we both realized this was somehow a watershed moment - the first such unfortunate occurrence but not likely to be the last. But neither of us is overtly emotional, and so on impulse I brushed aside her quiet apologies and tried to lighten the moment with the dry sarcasm that's part of her legacy to me.
"Well, geez, Mom, " I said as I gently wiped her soft, papery thin skin, "I've had my arm up to the shoulder in a cow's ass. You'll have to admit this sort of pales by comparison!"
And then we both laughed and I realized that whatever comes, I'll manage to handle it.
Didn't read your blog -- but love how you've managed to mention it in every Erma Bombeck session I've been in. Kudos and congrats on your blatant self-promotion. It's impressive. Again, props to you!
ReplyDeleteOne, I'm wondering why you didn't confront me in person if this irritated you. Two, if you let a no 'count scribbler like me bother you, you've obviously got larger issues to deal with. Three, this was my first conference, I was happy and excited to be there, and if what I did was a breach of etiquette for conference attendees, I'm sure Erma herself would have found a more polite and classy way to let me know.
ReplyDeleteFirst, i think it's great that you're close to your mother, both physically and emotionally, to be able to take care of her when she needs it most. Unlike typically American senior assisted living homes, the Spanish take care of their elders at home, so I have seen various occasions where my mother-in-law has taken care of her 99-yr old bed-ridden mother and 96 year old husband. Both were unable to make it to the bathroom, and both went full-circle in life, to a baby-like stage just like you and i were newborns. God bless her that she is still able to live on her own!
ReplyDeleteSecondly, you've certainly heard the famous saying "you can please some of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time", obviously referring to how M2 sort of ruffled your feathers. He (she?)probably was just trying to get you to unnerve, and you satisfied him with a response.
Last but not least, have you read the book "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch (deceased)? I think you might like it. There is even a Facebook page in his memory.
Keep on writing!
Greg Howard