Inhabit This World
Wednesday. One last day before returning to the office. I did wash the car this morning, cleaned some of the bugs off. Noted a couple of small dings in the paint, some touch up is in order, nothing too terrible. I won't, of course. “You expect these things” goes the thought. Best to notice them a year after buying the beast, though. No great trauma after a year has passed. This task was enough for the day, certainly, no need to strain myself while I'm on vacation; get it together later for a sake or two down at the sushi place. A last burst of activity to cap the week, here in Oakland.
Thursday. First day back at work followed by my annual physical. My doctor suffers from a growing photography habit and we discuss the state of the art before getting down to business. No more checking the prostate, though, the prostate having checked out. He seemed interested in the fact the top of my palate and the sinuses still ache - less so, I opined, than in the past - nodding, as he did, the usual noncommittal nod as I talked. Could be. Getting better. Who knows?
Nothing terminal has come from it over these last three years, this being a good sign. The older I get the more amenable I am to good signs. The older I get the more I pucker up when test results are announced. There was a time when I front loaded my fretting over the needles. What a laugh. Needles are nothing compared to what they might portend. Now onward with the annual checkup at the dermatologist, the cardiologist, the urologist and, by then, I'll be ready for Fall. Or is it ”the fall”? It's a wise man who knows.
Where did that come from?
Oh, you know. I had an old friend track me down on the web this week and we've been comparing notes since our days in the 70's at the Rip Off Press. Another old friend, Ben Hardgrave, has evidently died of a rare form of Leukemia that is generally associated with chemicals used in the printing business during the 70's. Ben - what else? - was a printer at the Press: a genuinely good man, a reader of impeccable taste, the husband of a good friend, the father of a daughter who now lives in New York. And, you know, it makes you sit back and consider cracking a bottle of sake as you count, one after the other, the various cardiologists, urologists, dermatologists, surgeons, doctors, ducks and dentists who inhabit this world.
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