I wanted to write something great today. I've wanted to for a few days actually. Well, longer really, but it's been sort of twirling around in my head for a while trying to get out, with no real venue to speak of. You're probably aware by now that I have taken up piano lessons. I'm in my fourth week and already I'm making great strides (if I do say so myself). I'm learning all sorts of things about C,D,E,F,G and chords and timing and staffs and grandstaffs and what not. Additionally, I've had opportunity become of some things that have transpired at work, to assess what my next step is for work life, home life, etc. I've really tried to focus on being better on my scripture study, speaking kindly about others, forgiveness, being forgiven, being helpful and other things. Sometimes I feel like I'm a totally different person than I was a couple of years ago, sometimes I feel like I'm right back where I started again.
Well, anyway if you know me, you've probably seen a change in me. Some for the good, and some I need to still work on. I think that's why I took up the piano this year. I want something beautiful in my life. Something creative. Dont get me wrong, I'm totally surrounded by incredible and amazing, and yes, beautiful people. My spouse is without doubt the most beautiful of those blessings in my life. So I suppose it only stands to reason that she's also teaching me to play the piano. OK, so, I'll let you in on a little secret. Well, I think you dont know, but you probably already do, I love to sing. Yeah, I know, not that tough, not that cool, not that manly, but whatever. I love to sing some of the church hymns because they have a powerful message and they touch me deeply when I sing them. But lately, that's not enough. I think it's one thing to share in someone else's words and music and learn from them how their heart feels about this or that.
So, what I'm finding is that learning the piano is going to be quite an endeavor. One which I'm prepared to put the time in for, because I feel it's worth it. See, I'm ready to create again. For a while there, I was dead inside. Yeah, I know, I've had moments of great clarity, and moments of sheer terror at what I might find out about myself. I really lost all desire for anything. Not really a depression per se, but more of a loss of self. See, I used to leave little yellow stickies all over the house with artist's misconceptions about some project I wanted to work on. I draw sheds and I draw windmills and I draw technical schematics for patio's and other engineering stuff. But for a long time I lost that. We'd go up to our lot by Fruitland, and about all I could create was to cut a pad out with a backhoe to clear the sage brush. I was pretty well dead inside for ideas and any spark of excitement and personal growth.
Well, I guess what I'm saying is I'm getting that back. Two nights ago I sat almost straight up in the bed with a way to mount my solar panels that I bought for the trailer. Oh, you should see my vision too. It's simple, yet elegant, and efficient. I know, hold your applause 'till the end please. So, last year I bought two 225 gallon water tanks. One for a trailer, and one for the lot. See the idea is to fill up with water at my dad's place, then haul it over to my lot, and pump it in with a 12 volt pump into the one next to the trailer. Yeah, I acquired a metal stand that's about four feet off the ground to put this thing on, so that it gravity feeds into my trailer. Then we (dad and I) planted some trees. Then I drew a whole slew more of schematics with how to plant a row of maples for a wind-break, and a watering system. This Spring I bought those solar panels and yesterday my dad and I went over to my trailer at Camp Williams to put one together and see how it ticks. It's beautiful man, I tell yeah. At the end of the day I plan on having six 12v batteries and my two 45 watt panels charging. Then I'm going to get an inverter to run 110 off of it, and see how it works. I also have plans to buy a 600 watt windmill next year if I get the money in time.
I guess my point is, that I've come alive again inside. It feels really good and I'm excited about it. I'm so busy working on plans for a septic tank, and now a waterline and the tax money to enable us to do that is already on it's way. Oh, see I was nervous that the taxes would only pay for a septic tank, but last week I found out about a water connection I could get that would allow us to have both water and a place to put it this year. I'm pretty stoked about the whole deal to say the least. Then I also have my solar panel and battery pack project, and my brain is working again to create what I consider beautiful things. See, to me, I've already seen the vision of what our little place is going to look like. A metal building for our trailer to go under, a septic tank and a yard pump to fill the water up, a timer to water the trees, fencing around it and a split rail fence around the parking area. I have the kid's play house which needs a little tweaking and a safety railing. Guess what? It's all coming together.
I love working on things. Figuring out problems, coming up with practical and efficient solutions is really my thing. Yeah, I realize it's really geeky, and guess what? I just dont care. It's really something that gives me a creative outlet for all this stuff that goes around and around in my head all day.
So, about the piano lessons. Here's how I see it. I want to be a well rounded person. Yeah, I'm already a little tubby around the middle, but I mean mentally, emotionally, creatively and especially now, spiritually. There are so many valuable and worthwhile things in this world. So many things to occupy our attention. So many possibilities. I could just as easily make this year a study on human anatomy and basic chemistry. Or I could learn about Civil War history. I could start work on my MBA like I know I will start this year. So so many opportunities. But I've decided to focus instead on those things that bring my family and me the greatest satisfaction. These kids aren't going to live in our home forever. Anything I do needs to include them and maximizing out time together as a family. I am going to take more leave this year and take Josh fishing and camping more. I'm going to hook onto that trailer and drag it away from our lot a couple of times this year. I'm going to learn to be a better mentor for my son's football program and less of a side-lines yeller.
Oh, and I promised you I was going to tie that piano thing in. I'm going to add something beautiful. See, with the septic tank, and the solar panels and those things, I satisfy my need for necessary creation. I satisfy my inner geek at working through the calculations for Ohms Law and the angle of the solar panels and the cheapest but best way to mount them. I get all that. The water line allows me to start planting. Planting of course in and of itself is really a metaphor for life isn't it? The walnut trees I plant this year, will twenty years from now provide shade for Josh's kids. I imagine a tire swing from one of them. Putting up a fence allows me to get a goat. Yeah, I said a goat. Stacey's always wanted a miniature goat. So, if I have water, and a fence, why not a goat to chew down the weeds around the fences? Hey, this is our dream, get your own. But the piano...the piano is something I've never considered. See, I have an ability to write things down. I can make people laugh, I can tug at their heart strings. But once I've written it down, I have to re-read it and then critique my spelling, my grammatical infractions and it loses it's luster. I'm a thinker but more than that I'm a "feeler". I feel things that remind me I'm still alive, I'm still here, and I'm still learning.
That's what I really want from the piano. I want to be able to open my heart up and pour it out through some of my favorite songs once I've learned them. I'll give you an example, you know the theme from, The Man from Snowy River? Yeah, I'd like to be able to play that. I'd also like to be able to play some of the songs from, "Phantom of the Opera." I already told I like to sing, but there's a part of my person that's not being expressed or explored. That's what I'm hoping for with this experience. Perhaps I'm not going to be any good at the piano. Perhaps I might be really really good. I just dont know yet. But I feel like there's an aspect of my personality that's languishing and needs to be exercised. I love the military. I love the responsibility, the life or death reality of my work. I love writing. I love bringing someone into my world for fifteen minutes while they read my intimate thoughts. I love creating and engineering projects, so I love to work on my lot...but most of all, I love beautiful things. I want to be able to play in music, what I hear in my head when I'm 2 days from a trailhead in the Uintah Mountains. I want to put into play what I feel when I walk through golden aspens in late September as the wind plays on the leaves and I smell the beginning decay of the season. I want to put into music what I feel when I see my children, engrossed in watching, "Bambi" for the very first time and to see her expression when the birds flutter and sing and Bambi discovers a skunk named, "Flower". These are the moments that are fleeting. They're one of a kind to say the least. They are special, and they are a manifestation of the reality of a Heavenly Father that must also rejoice when he sees me learning and growing and making righteous and Heavenly choices.
So that's what I want. I want that part of me. I want to capture that, bottle it, and be able to play it back when I'm having a tough day. I want to be able to exact those moments a little more at will, and a little less by chance. I want that something beautiful for me and mine.
Anyhow, I should close. I've rattled off enough nonesense for today. I'm going to shut down the computer again and soak in my wife and kids. I'm going to enjoy the last fleeting hours we have before the world steps in and requires of us another hectic week. But before the end of the day, I'm going to sit down and practice my piano lesson, and then, after I think I've done the best I can, I'm going to ask Stacey if she has time, to play me something beautiful.
I hope you find something beautiful in your day too.
J
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Salon Selectives...Salon Glow....
So there I was, last Thursday. Thought I'd sache' on over to the haircut place to get my ears lowered. Yeah, I know you're wondering why I keep going back to that place, but it turns out that Katie can cut a mean fade and I drill was coming up quickly.
So anyhow, I got my haircut, and again, Katie came through for me. She took a normally abnormal me, and turned me into the finest near-normal I can be. But I digress. Anyhow, so she always talks me into the rinse. Well, really she shampoos it but I dont want you thinking I'm some kind of fruity-pants so we'll just keep it to rinsing if anyone asks. Anyhow, so...I am lying back in the chair, the little brown towel wrapped about my neck, and of course she's fiddlin' around with the temperature. So, she puts what's meant to be a totally organic experience into my hair and commences to scratchin' me behind the ears. Well of course my left leg starts moving and I turn my head into her hand and my belly up thinking this is a pretty good deal for this ol' dog.
So, I'm sitting there, and she starts touching between my eyebrows. Which, I was thoroughly convinced was readily apparent there were two separate, and distinct brows. So she says, "This is really buggin' me, can we get rid of it?" So I'm a l ittle taken aback, and I was like, "huh?" so she says cautiously, "Well, you shave it dont you?" which I can't rightly argue with, however it's not like I have a uni-brow or anything, I'm just taking the onsie-twosies off to maintain that good-order and discipline look I've been cultivating. So I stammer out that yes, in very point of fact I occasionally, however slight or however inconsequential it may be, do in fact, rarely, if ever...sorta...shave it yeah. So she says, "Well let me wax it for ya. M-kay?" So, of course I dont want to hurt this poor lass' feelings, and you know what? It's only money right, and it can't really hurt, and...well...WHEN IN ROME?! Ya know?
So, anyhow, she pastes on this goop, which I thoroughly expected to be hot. Which it wasn't. It was luke-warm at best. It sets for a second, then she RIPS it off. Which, was a bit of a surprise. Not nearly as surprising as her going back for seconds..and...well thirds. So this whole time we're laughing about that movie, "40 Year Old Virgin" in which Steve Carell (spell that on your own time), has the same thing done on his chest and ends up with a bloody smiley face on his chest seeping through this t-shirt.
Anyhow, so...I go look in the mirror, and I dont see a remarkable difference between, "Before" and "After" but..ya know, whatever right? Just a little red circle in the center of my brows. So, anyhow, I go up front we check out, she doesnt charge me, so I over-tip her. Too easy right?
Well I get back to the orifice, and Ami, the Family Support Lady, says, "Captain K, what happened to your forehead?" To which I said, "Promise you wont laugh? The lady waxed it." Which, starts Ami laughing, almost hysterically. Well, back up. I SPECIFICALLY told Katie, that the only way I'd let her do this, would be if she swore it to secrecy, so none of the guys would make fun of me back at the orifice, right? Well enter stage-left, "Irony" AGAIN. Yeah, so now I have to spend the next six days explaining to everyone and their dog how it is that I've come to own a giant red diamond on my forehead, which...really is just a manifestation of the missing top-two layers of skin.
Yeah, it's that ridiculous. Anyhow, so I learned my lesson, and everyone gets a good belly laugh when I tell them what happened. So much for secrecy right? Yeah, anyhow, there's really no moral to the story I guess. Just another one of those, "WHY ME?!" Moments.
Alright I gotta go. I have piano lessons tonight. Second lesson and I didnt practice all weekend because I had drill. "C,D,E,F,G" both hands. Rinse, lather, and repeat as inspired.
I gotta go man.
J
So anyhow, I got my haircut, and again, Katie came through for me. She took a normally abnormal me, and turned me into the finest near-normal I can be. But I digress. Anyhow, so she always talks me into the rinse. Well, really she shampoos it but I dont want you thinking I'm some kind of fruity-pants so we'll just keep it to rinsing if anyone asks. Anyhow, so...I am lying back in the chair, the little brown towel wrapped about my neck, and of course she's fiddlin' around with the temperature. So, she puts what's meant to be a totally organic experience into my hair and commences to scratchin' me behind the ears. Well of course my left leg starts moving and I turn my head into her hand and my belly up thinking this is a pretty good deal for this ol' dog.
So, I'm sitting there, and she starts touching between my eyebrows. Which, I was thoroughly convinced was readily apparent there were two separate, and distinct brows. So she says, "This is really buggin' me, can we get rid of it?" So I'm a l ittle taken aback, and I was like, "huh?" so she says cautiously, "Well, you shave it dont you?" which I can't rightly argue with, however it's not like I have a uni-brow or anything, I'm just taking the onsie-twosies off to maintain that good-order and discipline look I've been cultivating. So I stammer out that yes, in very point of fact I occasionally, however slight or however inconsequential it may be, do in fact, rarely, if ever...sorta...shave it yeah. So she says, "Well let me wax it for ya. M-kay?" So, of course I dont want to hurt this poor lass' feelings, and you know what? It's only money right, and it can't really hurt, and...well...WHEN IN ROME?! Ya know?
So, anyhow, she pastes on this goop, which I thoroughly expected to be hot. Which it wasn't. It was luke-warm at best. It sets for a second, then she RIPS it off. Which, was a bit of a surprise. Not nearly as surprising as her going back for seconds..and...well thirds. So this whole time we're laughing about that movie, "40 Year Old Virgin" in which Steve Carell (spell that on your own time), has the same thing done on his chest and ends up with a bloody smiley face on his chest seeping through this t-shirt.
Anyhow, so...I go look in the mirror, and I dont see a remarkable difference between, "Before" and "After" but..ya know, whatever right? Just a little red circle in the center of my brows. So, anyhow, I go up front we check out, she doesnt charge me, so I over-tip her. Too easy right?
Well I get back to the orifice, and Ami, the Family Support Lady, says, "Captain K, what happened to your forehead?" To which I said, "Promise you wont laugh? The lady waxed it." Which, starts Ami laughing, almost hysterically. Well, back up. I SPECIFICALLY told Katie, that the only way I'd let her do this, would be if she swore it to secrecy, so none of the guys would make fun of me back at the orifice, right? Well enter stage-left, "Irony" AGAIN. Yeah, so now I have to spend the next six days explaining to everyone and their dog how it is that I've come to own a giant red diamond on my forehead, which...really is just a manifestation of the missing top-two layers of skin.
Yeah, it's that ridiculous. Anyhow, so I learned my lesson, and everyone gets a good belly laugh when I tell them what happened. So much for secrecy right? Yeah, anyhow, there's really no moral to the story I guess. Just another one of those, "WHY ME?!" Moments.
Alright I gotta go. I have piano lessons tonight. Second lesson and I didnt practice all weekend because I had drill. "C,D,E,F,G" both hands. Rinse, lather, and repeat as inspired.
I gotta go man.
J
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Cone of Shame...
Alright kids. Here it is. The update you've all been waiting for. Listen, rare are the people who will tell you the truth about things in life, and rarer still are those that won't pull any punches. So I'm going to tell you about my recent trip to the urologist to fix my own little wagon.
Yeah, so there I was, just back from my trip to South Carolina. I arrived home later on the evening of the 16th of December just in time for a weekend. First weekend I'd had off since the end of November. I'd had drill the weekend before leaving for South Carolina. Anyhow, Monday after I got back I just wasn't feelin' it, so I took a day of leave, then went in Tuesday to work. Tuesday I left early from work for my initial meeting with the urologist. Oh, let me tell you how that went down. So I'm sitting there right? Anyhow I figured they were going to want to take a tour or something so I made sure to update everything in the region. However, once I got there, I found myself meeting with a male P.A. whom did his darndest to play, "Stump the Chump" and try and get me to admit under great pressure that I in fact was not CERTAIN that I wanted to self-limit my procreative properties. Anyhow, after answering an increasingly hostile barrage of questions regarding my five children, my age, my wife's age, my favorite color, the velocity of an un-laden swallow, and a myriad of other questions, I apparenlty advanced to round 2.
So, two days later, I have Stacey bring me in to the vet for the inevitable. I'd pretty well realized that at near 40, with 5 of my own children, and no prospects of ever retiring or enjoying our golden years with any semblance of security, I reluctantly admitted to myself, and to others that it was time to hang it up. Figuratively speaking of course.
So anyhow, we're sittin' there in the lobby, ma in her kerchief and I in my cap, reluctantly accepting the work on my lap. So, the lady, I'll call her, "Mrs. Poole" at the counter, invites me back alone, and quite nervous to come back and have my vitals taken again. So, she puts the cuff on my arm then starts to overly cheerily talk with me. First question she asks me is, "Is that your wife out there?" So of course I say, "yes." Then she says, "Oh, you two look like you could be brother and sister." But she says it, quite convincingly. So, realizing the gravity of why where here, and the multiple levels of irony involved am now wondering in a split second: 1) WHO brings there SISTER to get a vasectomy???!; 2) Do Stacey and I have ONE characteristic in common that would EVER prompt ANYONE to every think we're even remotely related???; and 3) WHAT medication is this lady on that she's so cavalier with busting out accusations about my continuing to sleep with my sister in order to have five children then have the presence of mind to finally have a vasectomy so that our illegal and immoral union stops producing extra-chromosomal children??! So, all that goes through my head in a split second and I stammer out, "No, she's my wife. Really? You think we look alike? Huh.. interesting. Never heard that before."
So, about that time Mrs. Poole and her overly-chipper self(ves) lets loose her hold on my arm and invites me back to the foyer to sit with the other non-papered unwashed and unlucky vermine to await our final fate. So, we sit there another ten minutes, then this little petite blonde gal in blue scrubs comes out and invites me back. So, I of course ask if Stacey can come back with me, and away we go a walkin'.
We head about ten feet down the hall and make a left into this little closet of a room with counters along one side, Christmas music on a Bose radio, I think a refridgerator, and this operating table and a single chair. So, Blondie with the giant blue eyes, and all 100 lb of her tells me to take everything off from the waist down, lay on the table and cover myself with this folded paper-blanket thing till she comes back. She leaves and Stacey and I make small talk while I disrobe and assume le positione'. So, I'm lying there, rather uncomfortably, enjoying the irony of the breeze on my nether-region and Alvin and the Chipmunks singing about Christmas time awaiting my fate.
About that time Ms. Blondie comes in and starts some small talk while she prepares a little vat of iodine or betadine or some sorta dine and proceeds to rip off my covering without so much fanfare and proceed to wa(r)sh my newly Naired nethers with her concoction (pardon the pun) and then what felt like some sorta cream or something. But she did it all with what felt like a sponge of rather unforgiving dimentions and didn't so much as slow down around some of the more sensitive of areas. I remember thinking, "she must not be married, othewise she'd have learned to be a little more compassionate in that arena."
Well, in strolls Dr. C. with his pony tail and sixties groovy-guy look. I'd come in uniform on Tuesday, and apparenlty that had made it around the office. Oh, let me back up a tad. So, the P.A. I met with on Tuesday was such a condescending sonofabitch I almost punched him in his left ear. But after a while it became comical. The first time he was talking about a, "Scrotum" which apparenlty is such a large word for an Army guy that he had to dumb it down with a noticable correction as, "..you know? Balls." Then as he's talking again he says, "sutures" he apparently again catches himself and states, "you know, 'stiches'." So about this time I'm just flabbergasted at his attitude and I start to play along with him. About the time he started to educate me on the, "indent at the base of a penis" wherein the Dr. was going to make an, "incision" or "cut", I was just smirking at how I at least would walk out of here still in the Army, HE would walk out of here as a friggin' male NURSE with an additional concentration of study in writing tablets and how to prescribe antibiotics. Ass bag.
Anyhow, so Dr. C. and I rap a little while he's prepping stuff about this and that and how he was in the Army Reserves for a while and how we both used to make home-made explosives and etc. So, Blondie, whom has her surgical mask over her mouth is on the left hip, and Dr. C is on my right hip. So, Dr. C, without aid of previously numbing the area, nor having even so much as offered me a valium, places this 3' square sheet of blue paper, about the texture of the one your dentist puts around your neck over my boys. I then realize there is a perfectly round circle in the center of this sheet. I've quickly surmised that SOMETHING of mine is going to pass through to the one side and the rest of me is going to stay quite separated on the other. Well...see, this particular hole, is about the diameter of one of your lesser bottles of Gatoraid openings. Suffice it to say, I was not thoroughly convinced that the boys (Mr. James Westfall and Dr. Kenneth Noisewater) where going to fit through their. Well, much to my chagrine, and quite suprised I might add, the boys did. The Octogon on the other hand, was left guessing on MY side of the blue Tarp of Death.
Well I thought that was the worst part of the procedure. Except of course, as my nekkid legs and feet involuntarily move at my wincing as Dr. C searches for cords and what not quite unapologetically. A couple of times my military bearing was almost lost as I quite literally straighted my whole body out like a board as Dr. C. and the lovely Ms. Blondie went to tuggin' and pullin' on stuff. Oh, also particularly humiliating was how Dr. C. asked me in front of Nurse Blondie when I shaved that area because apparently I'd nicked myself. Well, not having a special mirror and razor set for the specified purpose I'd thought I did a rather fine job, all things considered. Anyhow, rather thoroughly humiliated (or so I thought) they "sutured" up my..."scrotum" (these big words are on the test by the way) and then replaced the original paper sheet back over the affected area.
So, then Ms. Blondie, with my wife in a chair and me on my back starts to explain to me for, "like the 100th time today" that this bottle of soap is LABELED as 'Hand Sanitizer' but is in fact soap, then went on and on about the pump in their other bottle ..blah blah blah blah. So, I kept my composure and she tells me I can get dressed now, and she leaves. So, I get all the way dressed, and she knocks on the door and comes back in, then informs me that I now am encouraged to wash the region before leaving in the very sink here using paper-towels, the aforementioned "soap" and some good old college enginuity considering that the counter was just over belt-level. So, as she's esplainin' this to us, she says that her and her husband (turns out I was wrong) were looking at moving into the Riverton area if they were successful on a bid for a condo. So, of course, already humiliated beyond repair, we say, "where about?" So, she says, oh, just south of 12600 South, about 4500 West. To which we realize...is most likely within our Ward boundaries. So, now I'm picturing our joyous reunion in which she has ZERO idea who I am, but I recognize Ms. Blondie and those cat-like blue eyes and the less-than-careful way she handled our...situation.
Anyhow, the next 48 hours I watched every conceivable combination on The Netflix with a bag of mixed veggies (with btw, you STILL need to put in a ziplock or they'll leak all over your undies when they melt). I received a lot of good natured ribbing, but Stacey was a total angel in bringing me grilled cheese sammiches, Diet Luv, or whatever else I could order as I sat there for the next two days. I didnt have to wear the cone of shame like I've seen other dogs come home from the vet with, so I counted myself fairly lucky in every regard.
Well, true to form I was only down for a couple of days, but I waited a few days before I walked more than a hundred feet or so. You're supposed to wait, "10 DAYS" before attempting a personal release, and I'd say we almost made it 3 days. Which by the way, was probably the second scariest thing I'd ever done. 1st scarriest thing is getting shot at, 2nd scarriest is of course the possibility you've lost your ability to shoot back.
Anyhow I gotta put this in the mail and get engaged in family life again. All the best of course. I hope you had a wonderful Christmas, and that your New Years is prosperous and that you and your family enjoy the greatest blessings that God has to offer you.
All the best,
J
Yeah, so there I was, just back from my trip to South Carolina. I arrived home later on the evening of the 16th of December just in time for a weekend. First weekend I'd had off since the end of November. I'd had drill the weekend before leaving for South Carolina. Anyhow, Monday after I got back I just wasn't feelin' it, so I took a day of leave, then went in Tuesday to work. Tuesday I left early from work for my initial meeting with the urologist. Oh, let me tell you how that went down. So I'm sitting there right? Anyhow I figured they were going to want to take a tour or something so I made sure to update everything in the region. However, once I got there, I found myself meeting with a male P.A. whom did his darndest to play, "Stump the Chump" and try and get me to admit under great pressure that I in fact was not CERTAIN that I wanted to self-limit my procreative properties. Anyhow, after answering an increasingly hostile barrage of questions regarding my five children, my age, my wife's age, my favorite color, the velocity of an un-laden swallow, and a myriad of other questions, I apparenlty advanced to round 2.
So, two days later, I have Stacey bring me in to the vet for the inevitable. I'd pretty well realized that at near 40, with 5 of my own children, and no prospects of ever retiring or enjoying our golden years with any semblance of security, I reluctantly admitted to myself, and to others that it was time to hang it up. Figuratively speaking of course.
So anyhow, we're sittin' there in the lobby, ma in her kerchief and I in my cap, reluctantly accepting the work on my lap. So, the lady, I'll call her, "Mrs. Poole" at the counter, invites me back alone, and quite nervous to come back and have my vitals taken again. So, she puts the cuff on my arm then starts to overly cheerily talk with me. First question she asks me is, "Is that your wife out there?" So of course I say, "yes." Then she says, "Oh, you two look like you could be brother and sister." But she says it, quite convincingly. So, realizing the gravity of why where here, and the multiple levels of irony involved am now wondering in a split second: 1) WHO brings there SISTER to get a vasectomy???!; 2) Do Stacey and I have ONE characteristic in common that would EVER prompt ANYONE to every think we're even remotely related???; and 3) WHAT medication is this lady on that she's so cavalier with busting out accusations about my continuing to sleep with my sister in order to have five children then have the presence of mind to finally have a vasectomy so that our illegal and immoral union stops producing extra-chromosomal children??! So, all that goes through my head in a split second and I stammer out, "No, she's my wife. Really? You think we look alike? Huh.. interesting. Never heard that before."
So, about that time Mrs. Poole and her overly-chipper self(ves) lets loose her hold on my arm and invites me back to the foyer to sit with the other non-papered unwashed and unlucky vermine to await our final fate. So, we sit there another ten minutes, then this little petite blonde gal in blue scrubs comes out and invites me back. So, I of course ask if Stacey can come back with me, and away we go a walkin'.
We head about ten feet down the hall and make a left into this little closet of a room with counters along one side, Christmas music on a Bose radio, I think a refridgerator, and this operating table and a single chair. So, Blondie with the giant blue eyes, and all 100 lb of her tells me to take everything off from the waist down, lay on the table and cover myself with this folded paper-blanket thing till she comes back. She leaves and Stacey and I make small talk while I disrobe and assume le positione'. So, I'm lying there, rather uncomfortably, enjoying the irony of the breeze on my nether-region and Alvin and the Chipmunks singing about Christmas time awaiting my fate.
About that time Ms. Blondie comes in and starts some small talk while she prepares a little vat of iodine or betadine or some sorta dine and proceeds to rip off my covering without so much fanfare and proceed to wa(r)sh my newly Naired nethers with her concoction (pardon the pun) and then what felt like some sorta cream or something. But she did it all with what felt like a sponge of rather unforgiving dimentions and didn't so much as slow down around some of the more sensitive of areas. I remember thinking, "she must not be married, othewise she'd have learned to be a little more compassionate in that arena."
Well, in strolls Dr. C. with his pony tail and sixties groovy-guy look. I'd come in uniform on Tuesday, and apparenlty that had made it around the office. Oh, let me back up a tad. So, the P.A. I met with on Tuesday was such a condescending sonofabitch I almost punched him in his left ear. But after a while it became comical. The first time he was talking about a, "Scrotum" which apparenlty is such a large word for an Army guy that he had to dumb it down with a noticable correction as, "..you know? Balls." Then as he's talking again he says, "sutures" he apparently again catches himself and states, "you know, 'stiches'." So about this time I'm just flabbergasted at his attitude and I start to play along with him. About the time he started to educate me on the, "indent at the base of a penis" wherein the Dr. was going to make an, "incision" or "cut", I was just smirking at how I at least would walk out of here still in the Army, HE would walk out of here as a friggin' male NURSE with an additional concentration of study in writing tablets and how to prescribe antibiotics. Ass bag.
Anyhow, so Dr. C. and I rap a little while he's prepping stuff about this and that and how he was in the Army Reserves for a while and how we both used to make home-made explosives and etc. So, Blondie, whom has her surgical mask over her mouth is on the left hip, and Dr. C is on my right hip. So, Dr. C, without aid of previously numbing the area, nor having even so much as offered me a valium, places this 3' square sheet of blue paper, about the texture of the one your dentist puts around your neck over my boys. I then realize there is a perfectly round circle in the center of this sheet. I've quickly surmised that SOMETHING of mine is going to pass through to the one side and the rest of me is going to stay quite separated on the other. Well...see, this particular hole, is about the diameter of one of your lesser bottles of Gatoraid openings. Suffice it to say, I was not thoroughly convinced that the boys (Mr. James Westfall and Dr. Kenneth Noisewater) where going to fit through their. Well, much to my chagrine, and quite suprised I might add, the boys did. The Octogon on the other hand, was left guessing on MY side of the blue Tarp of Death.
Well I thought that was the worst part of the procedure. Except of course, as my nekkid legs and feet involuntarily move at my wincing as Dr. C searches for cords and what not quite unapologetically. A couple of times my military bearing was almost lost as I quite literally straighted my whole body out like a board as Dr. C. and the lovely Ms. Blondie went to tuggin' and pullin' on stuff. Oh, also particularly humiliating was how Dr. C. asked me in front of Nurse Blondie when I shaved that area because apparently I'd nicked myself. Well, not having a special mirror and razor set for the specified purpose I'd thought I did a rather fine job, all things considered. Anyhow, rather thoroughly humiliated (or so I thought) they "sutured" up my..."scrotum" (these big words are on the test by the way) and then replaced the original paper sheet back over the affected area.
So, then Ms. Blondie, with my wife in a chair and me on my back starts to explain to me for, "like the 100th time today" that this bottle of soap is LABELED as 'Hand Sanitizer' but is in fact soap, then went on and on about the pump in their other bottle ..blah blah blah blah. So, I kept my composure and she tells me I can get dressed now, and she leaves. So, I get all the way dressed, and she knocks on the door and comes back in, then informs me that I now am encouraged to wash the region before leaving in the very sink here using paper-towels, the aforementioned "soap" and some good old college enginuity considering that the counter was just over belt-level. So, as she's esplainin' this to us, she says that her and her husband (turns out I was wrong) were looking at moving into the Riverton area if they were successful on a bid for a condo. So, of course, already humiliated beyond repair, we say, "where about?" So, she says, oh, just south of 12600 South, about 4500 West. To which we realize...is most likely within our Ward boundaries. So, now I'm picturing our joyous reunion in which she has ZERO idea who I am, but I recognize Ms. Blondie and those cat-like blue eyes and the less-than-careful way she handled our...situation.
Anyhow, the next 48 hours I watched every conceivable combination on The Netflix with a bag of mixed veggies (with btw, you STILL need to put in a ziplock or they'll leak all over your undies when they melt). I received a lot of good natured ribbing, but Stacey was a total angel in bringing me grilled cheese sammiches, Diet Luv, or whatever else I could order as I sat there for the next two days. I didnt have to wear the cone of shame like I've seen other dogs come home from the vet with, so I counted myself fairly lucky in every regard.
Well, true to form I was only down for a couple of days, but I waited a few days before I walked more than a hundred feet or so. You're supposed to wait, "10 DAYS" before attempting a personal release, and I'd say we almost made it 3 days. Which by the way, was probably the second scariest thing I'd ever done. 1st scarriest thing is getting shot at, 2nd scarriest is of course the possibility you've lost your ability to shoot back.
Anyhow I gotta put this in the mail and get engaged in family life again. All the best of course. I hope you had a wonderful Christmas, and that your New Years is prosperous and that you and your family enjoy the greatest blessings that God has to offer you.
All the best,
J
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