This morning--another trip to the dermatologist and the usual doings there. I first started going, oh, about fifteen years ago, and it wasn't long after that before he found a squamous cell cancer between my eyebrows; surgery ensued; I looked like Frankenstein's creature for pretty much a full summer. But the scar is indistinguishable now, though I still have an unreasonable fear of fire.
Since then it's mostly been six-month exams, almost always accompanied by some face-freezings. I had about a half-dozen today and felt, driving home from his West Akron office, that I'd been shot multiple times with a b-b gun. (I do know what that feels like, by the way. Boyhood stuff. Oklahoma. You know ...)
Anyway, about a week from now, the scabs will have formed and begun to fall away. I've learned not to pick them, of course. That would be ... childish, right? Self-destructive?)
Today was one of the days I got to strip down to my undies and don a plastic "gown" that I managed to mangle as I was putting it on, a mischance that the doctor noted with a twinkle. I wanted to punch his twinkly face.
I'd just read, earlier in the morning, a Richard Russo story in which a character's father tells him that life is okay until the doctor makes you take your pants off. Agreed.
So, now, I'll heal. And wait for six months to whirl by. At which time I'll drive to West Akron for yet another face-freezing. Life. Ain't it grand?
No comments:
Post a Comment