Despite my new years toast, Christmas cheer, and my “by all means ignore the hacking cough gesture” handed out to neighbors or the passersby, over the past three weeks I have suffered from a cold, strep throat, a double ear infection and eventually bronchitis. At the start of this germ-infested journey, I visited an urgent care center in a rather affluent southern California area named after a fruit (you can figure it out from there). In this center, which looked more like a health spa, I was greeted with immediate deference and care. Like a sprinter out of the starting blocks, no more than five minutes after filling out my paper work I was sitting inside of a patient room reporting my laundry list of symptoms to a seemingly attentive doctor. Her reply came in the form of a question: “Do you want to be well by New Years Eve?” I nodded hesitantly because New Years Eve was a mere 24 hours away and I wasn’t convinced I was in the offices of a miracle doctor. There was no looking in my throat, no breathe deep dance between me and a stethoscope. While standing in the same position, she began to write me a list of medications that would no doubt ensure I would be clinking glasses with my girlfriends at the stroke of midnight the following day. From the infamous Z-pack, to pseudoephedrine, prescription strength Motrin, nasal spray and a concoction of candy coated prescriptions of my choosing I was wished a happy new year, complimented on my work for the local college and offered to be billed for my five dollar co-pay. I imagine if I requested so, I could have opened a tab. With a cloudy head, a full medicine cabinet and a new found realization why the reality shows chronicling the housewives and entitled teens of this city all find themselves on celebrity rehab, I managed to get worse instead of better. Days later, I called my primary care physician and with my “so called good work in the community” I was told there was no need to drive down and yet another prescription was called in. After uncontrollable shakes and fevers that persisted through the night, I did revisit the city named after a juice and it was eventually determined I had strep throat and an ear infection. The plethora of drugs I was already on would cover those things so there was no reason to perform any more tests...that is, until I woke from a nap and couldn’t breathe. In an attempt to fend off the melodrama that can come so natural to a creative mind, I convinced myself of course I can breathe. If I can talk I can clearly breathe. Hours later there was no more internal dialogue, the shortness of breathe was so palpable that the local ER in a less lucrative area of Los Angeles took me from lobby to back room in 35 minutes (more than the 5 minute wait at the health spa), but still pretty fast considering. I sat on a gurney alongside a 96 year old man who shared with me the righteousness of his church, a ranting drug seeking woman who was working her way toward a police detail, a teenager bleeding from so many places I couldn’t tell if he was jumped or involved in a red paint gun attack and loud talking nurses and doctors who threw witty banter over their shoulders, translating multiple languages as best they could and effectively ignoring the stench of an adult in full diaper shrouded only by a thin curtain. In this new city, I was greeted with a different type of doctor. She was calm but curt, diligent but direct. She had that “take no guff” maternal quality paired with an “I can do this in my sleep if I could even get any sleep” demeanor about her. From breathing treatments to chest x-rays and a multitude of tests in between, there was no discussing about my “role in the community” or what drugs I preferred. She eventually diagnosed me with bronchitis bordering on pneumonia and she gave me some free advice for the road. “Don’t allow yourself to fall prey to professional liabilities.” She defined this as being, “so educated and accomplished that people give you what you want instead of give you what you need.” In a world where people get shot in the name of democracy (talk about professional liabilities) and unnamed heroes prevail amidst the tragedies of homegrown terrorism, lets clink our glasses this new year to the doctors, nurses, teachers, preachers, artists, activists and wide-eyed children who do the right thing even when no one is watching. This is a story of two cities and rest assure I know how fortunate I am to be in the position to tell this story. I am employed, I have health insurance and I am blessed because I have choices. Annie Dillard has suggested what separates man from animal is that humans have the ability to choose. I’d add what makes some people superhuman, is how they heroically respond in the absence of choices and in the presence of perilous professional liabilities.
