Chapter 1 – Shit happens

/ June 10, 2009

Thursday, 28 May 2009

10:15 am

“I’ll drive!”, I declared to my dad. He smiled which means “No, but I am open to debates”. We were going to the hospital. I had been having this constant tiredness in muscles all over for about a week now. I sat quietly in the passenger seat. “You are not even carrying your license with you”, he said. He had a valid point. I had just got up, brushed my teeth and got out of the house. I was expecting to be asked for my urine and stool samples at the hospital. I can’t satisfy the demand if I am out of supplies. Dad started reversing the car. BUMP! Bumped into a still car. Dad looked around. No one. We flew. That was a point in my favour. I have a much better miles per bump (mpb) record. But I was tired and kept quiet. It did not seem worth the 5 minutes drive.

5 miutues later

Just before dad parked the car, we almost bumped into an empty roadside stall. But almost bump don’t count; if that was not the case I’d start losing on the mpb scale. Anyways, we go into the hospital. Now you need to know something about my dad. When someone tries to explain something new to my dad, he/she has to repeat a number of times before my dad completely understands him/her. So we are in the hospital and dad start his bad cop routine with the poor male receptionist.

Bad Cop: Who is the physician on duty?

Receptionist: Sir, here is the list of our doctors with their timings. OPD is on 1st floor. The receptionist there would know.

(Receptionist hands over a sheet of paper. Bad cop reads through it)

Bad Cop: This says Dr. R. S. Chhugani is supposed to be here at 10 am. Where does he sit?

Receptionist: Sir, he only comes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

Bad Cop: Who is the physician on duty?

Receptionist: Sir, why don’t you go to 1st floor?

Bad Cop: But where is Dr. Chhugani…

(Good Cop interrupts. That’s me)

Good Cop: Dad, may be he is telling the truth. Let us see the 1st floor.

(Bad Cop smiles which means touché. The cops leave for the 1st floor)

Here again dad struggled a bit with the receptionist, but the conclusion was that the physician will arrive at 11:30 am. We left for home.

5 minutes later

“What did the doctor say? Is it diabetes? Thyroid?”, mom started her part of the interrogation right as she opened the door. Dad has had diabetes for about 20 years now, and mom has had thyroid for 7 years. Both are hereditary. Apparently my tiredness is a symptom of both diabetes and thyroid along with anaemia, AIDS, and a lot others. Mom only knew of diabetes and thyroid, which was enough to scare her. “There is no physician in the hospital right now. We’ll go back later”, dad said. As mom’s blood pressure got back to normal, she laid down on the floor. This is usual. As far as I remember mom always liked to lie on the floor, with the exception of one house we lived in. I did not like that particular floor either. Anyways I did not want to hold it for another hour. So I went straight to the bathroom. And shit happened…

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