Wednesday, February 7, 2007


DO YOU HAVE ANY OF THESE SYMPTOMS:
Weight loss?
Coughing up blood?
No appetite?
Night sweats?
Fever?
Difficulty breathing?
Fatigue?

PLEASE SEE THE NURSE NOW !!!


The strangest dream I have had recently, I had last night; it was about this guy I knew a million years ago named Enzo. I knew him in High School. Enzo had somehow died in an EZ Cheeze related incident, the details of which remain lost in a haze of startled- morning- wake-up unclear. In order to understand his death, the entire graduating class of 1998 began emptying cans of EZ Cheeze onto the football fields of a high school that could have been Pacifica High School, but was not, in fact, Pacifica High School.

Through the remnants of the cheese-glop, we were searching for Enzo's killer. The best part was that Enzo was overseeing. My friend Sarah (who did not, as far as I remember, attend high school with me) spotted it first.

Embedded in the Cheeze, which came from one of the cans she was wielding, was a snail, with a broken shell, and a pair of spectacles lodged inside of it. Perfectly intact spectacles inside a scared, damaged snail's back.

-Paging Dr. Freud.
-Paging Dr. Freud.

This is what had taken Enzo in the end. We all knew he would go strangely. Enzo was relieved that we had found the culprit.

I had a better time at the Gynecologist yesterday than I did at Kinko's. It was actually more emotionally draining scanning one picture at Kinko's than it was having my cervix inspected. I was put more at ease by the woman yelling my HIV test results down the hall, with a thumbs up and a smile, at the free clinic, than at the corporate institution where things should be as simple as making a god damned facsimile.

Kinko's once a year. The OB/GYN for life, I say.

The clinic I went to was nicknamed "Gougy."
This adorable, somewhat overly appropriate, little moniker was on all the awards and certificates that hung all over its walls. Little "Gougy" made me feel loved and cared for. Like the first time someone told me my Cervix was a Pink Cute Success.

Love Life Hint: Want a lady to be yours for life? Just tell her that.

At Gougy, I was fortunate to meet the super hero Georgia Pollard. Georgia Pollard had a sign over her desk informing all incoming, that "Nobody notices what I do, until I don't do it."

She had a bible on her desk, six Troll Dolls, and a Spanish text book entitled Usted Y Yo.

Her poster for the NAACP proclaimed it, "the most feared and revered, most cussed, most discussed, civil rights organization in America."

Georgia Pollard runs a program that gets women their yearly annuals for free. She does it all on a volunteer basis, because there is no longer any funding for it. She told me she was at work until nine o'clock the night before and was having trouble reading her computer screen. It took fifteen minutes, give or take 20, to get me signed up for the program.

She put a pink sticker on my hospital card and told me to go get a refund on my co-pay.
Right now. Downstairs. Go.
My vulva and I said, thank you, so kindly, Mrs. Pollard.
Women who are saints work for low income families with very little attention. Everyone knows that, right?

No comments: