Personality Reinforcements

I went to an eye specialist yesterday, at a big hospital near here.  I arrived at 9:20 for my 9:30 appointment (I’m like that) and was told that the Doctor had a "personal situation" which meant that he wouldn’t actually be in until noon, maybe a little sooner.

I sat then, and churned out the last of my November socks, and thought horrible, terrible things about him and how he probably overslept.  Probably overslept because he was up late partying. No, wait.  Probably overslept because he was up late partying and he’s hung over, which is morally reprehensible when he’s responsible for peoples vision.  Actually, I bet he’s a married man but he overslept because he was partying with his mistress, and his wife cried all night about his drinking problem. What a turd.

I sat there, finishing the November socks (modeled shots tomorrow. It’s too dark and crappy out today for proper pictures) and I thought horrible things about him.

Sock pattern is Lenore, STR lightweight, colourway also Lenore.

At 11:30 I went back, and his receptionist said she’d "fit me in" (because the whole morning of cancelled appointments were now waiting, along with all the regularly scheduled people) and she took my information and put my file in a stack.  I waited again, sock now finished, and took out the big circle scarf/cowl thing I’m devising, and I plowed away on that.

At 11:50 I saw the Dr. and while he didn’t look like a philandering drunk, I knew the truth about him.  I was polite anyway.  He talked to me for a minute and sent me off for a visual fields test in another part of the hospital. 
I left to do that, and when I came back I entered another phase of waiting. At 1:00 I was back in front of him (the philandering drunk) and he said that I he would just put drops in my eyes, and that I should go away for thirty minutes to let them start working, then he would see me again.  I returned promptly at 1:30. (Again, I’m like that.)

As I watched, the receptionist picked up my file, and entered it behind all others in the queue, and told me the wait was probably going to be about thirty minutes and why didn’t I go away and then come back, and I decided two things.

1. Her system was all wrong.  I decided that if the wait was thirty minutes, and that the doctor gave drops that would take thirty minutes to work, that she should have put my file in the queue when he put the drops in, because then my turn would have arrived as the first thirty minutes were up.  I felt sure that this was the only possible way to do this – Never mind that I was reckoning this from the perspective of a knitting humour writer who’s specialties are banana bread and sarcasm – not the perspective of someone who wrangles patients for a living.

2. The second thing I decided (filled with wrath for her organizational abilities as I was)  was that she was probably who he was whoring around with last night.

I didn’t say any of that to anybody though (I’m also like that.) I just sat there, trying to knit on the scarf/cowl thing and making colossal mistakes because the drops had rendered me legally blind. This only fueled my rage. About ten minutes later a very nice lady sat down next to me, and asked me why I was trying to knit when I was obviously legally blind.  I didn’t really have an answer for her, so I mumbled something about the wait, and how knitting (well-or not) was really the only thing stopping me from losing my mind because I had now been at the hospital for about five hours, and had only seen the doctor for about 8 minutes.  I said nothing about the philandering drunk and his organizationally challenged mistress, but I might have projected an aura of discontent with their moral standards. 

That was when she told me that the Doctor had told her his mother had died suddenly the night before.

In that moment, I realized that the knitting was even more important than I thought.  It doesn’t just take the edge off, because even knitting to take my edge off, I had invented the worst possible scenario for this guy (and his receptionist, who probably wasn’t having a fantastic day either) and that in reality the knitting actually creating a personality forcefield that keeps that nightmare that is my actual personality under wraps and makes it possible for me to interact with other humans at all because in reality – though I keep thinking I’m not like that… this proves that I am.

I left there, after seeing the doctor about 30 minutes later, being thankful that I knit.  It is probably the only reason I can go back.