Exposure

On a Wednesday in March, I exposed myself to four preschool classrooms, a thrift shop, and a convenience store. This is how I think of going into the world, post-pandemic. Exposing myself.

Somewhere along the line I caught a cold. I didn’t admit that the runny nose was a cold until Friday, when I experienced the personal distress flag that my body sends out when something untoward is happening. Namely, I get the chills for a day when my body is fighting off a virus or infection.

An extra layer of clothing, hot liquids, and eventually covering myself in a throw blanket or two will ease the chills a bit, but even so they regularly roll over my body, no matter how many measures I take to alleviate them, no matter the ambient temperature. And that’s how I know I’m dealing with a malady.

The cold progressed as a normal cold. I took a covid test because I had a couple laying around; negative.

“I’m just building up my immunity again. Not so bad,” I thought. I slept more and drank fluids. The next Wednesday I congratulated myself on how well I recovered.

But then two things happened. The chills came icing back. And a little irritation started bothering me along the panty line. I attributed such irritation to the women-hating people who design women’s underwear with lumpy seams and razor-sharp laser-cut lace.

I was concerned about the chills, but not the irritation. It’s a common enough occurrence that I just change to a different brand of undies that produces a different irritation in a slightly different location. I suppose anatomy has something to do with it as well.

The chills continued, as did the irritation. Hmm. A couple days later it wasn’t an irritation, it was a swollen and very sore lump.

Damn.

I had told myself that as a single woman of seventy years of age there would probably (and in a certain way, sadly) be no reason to expose my bottom to anyone ever again. Yes, I’d had children and pap tests and various indignities through the years in all the different locations there, so I was no stranger to medical practitioners peering, poking, and prodding areas in the region. I had just decided that I was done with that whole scene.

The universe had other ideas.

I spent that very uncomfortable Friday vacillating between “Let’s just see what happens. You know most things go away on their own,” and “You have no idea what’s going on, you should get it checked out.” That night the lump started to bleed. And it seemed to grow. And was there another lump?

“Bleeding is either good or it’s bad,” I thought. “But expanding like that can’t be good.”

I parked in the lot at Urgent Care the next morning. Patients don’t walk in to the waiting room now; instead, they call a number plastered on the side of the building. The recording instructs one as to how to make an appointment. From one’s (hopefully smart) phone, there are medical information forms and various permissions to complete, sign, and send. If all the information is complete and satisfactory, the system sends an appointment time. And then tells you to call the number for the Urgent Care office, where an actual person answers the phone. They tell you that the time of the appointment is just generated by the system; ignore that. They give you a based-in-reality appointment time. In my case, I could go into an examination room immediately.

I sat on the end of the examining table, swinging my legs, clad in the oh-so-chic clinic gown, hearing the devilishly delighted laughter the universe seems to enjoy whilst thwarting my desires. I felt a bit sorry for myself.

The doctor came in and introduced himself using both first and last names. I noticed he thoroughly washed his hands. I like examination rooms where you can see the doc wash their hands. Otherwise, I wonder.

Then he sat on his stool and looked at me expectantly. I had to complain.

“I had decided I was never going to show my bottom to anyone ever again!”

He looked at me steadily.

“Whatever.”

That was exactly what I needed to hear. I mean, I had already decided I’d have to show my bottom and I was there, wasn’t I?

Now when I think about this ordeal, this is what I think of, and it makes me laugh every time.

“Whatever.”

We got on with business. He poked and prodded. It wasn’t comfortable.

“I was happy when you said it was bleeding,” he said. “Nature knows the best way to drain these things rather than me choosing a spot to lance it. It seems to be an abscess and some cellulitis. I’m sending a culture to the lab to see what bacteria it is. Hopefully, it’s not MRSA. Here’s what you have to do.”

Ten days of strong antibiotics. Either soak in a tub a few times a day or direct my hand-held showerhead to the affected area numerous times a day. Use hot water. In the shower, feel free to massage and squeeze the lumps to help empty the infected matter. Call if it wasn’t improved in three or four days or with any other concerns. Everything should be cleared up soon after the antibiotics were done.

Too sore to sit for three or four days, I lounged on the sofa and watched my new TV. I watched the first full season of, of, … hmmm? What was it? No idea. Whatever series it was is overwritten by two seasons plus this year’s episodes of “Designated Survivor.”

My eyes were tired and didn’t want to focus, my jaw slacked, I melted into the couch. I only begrudgingly arose to drink, eat, take medications, and drain the hot water heater with another upside-down shower. The house slowly descended into a hot mess. I didn't make my bed. Crumbs provided a crunchy walk. I filled the sink and counters with dirty dishes instead of simply putting them in the dishwasher. Somehow that seemed too complicated, and I had to watch the next episode. Priorities, you know. To bed at two a.m. I woke up groggy and stumbled my way to the couch to begin another day of “Designated Survivor.”

A good sixty or seventy hours of TV in just a few days.

Woo-hoo! Binge-watching at last! I am now part of popular culture!

And another worthy objective is checked off my bucket list.

Whatever.