Scars and Receipts

At the clinic today, I had a brief heart to heart with my doctor I had just had a chest x-ray and we were discussing the different things she could deduce from the image, while she was analysing it she asked if I had ever been to the hospital for any serious respiratory case; “well, I was once admitted for Pneumonia, but that was almost 20 years ago” I replied. I was quite surprised so I continued with a question “can you see that too?” she smiled and said “I see the scars”. I adjusted my seat, leaned forward and said “Scars? Please do explain”. This made her go a bit technical on me, she tried to explain what she meant by scars, you see, when big respiratory issues occur, they majorly affect your lungs, I’m talking about recurrent chesty coughs, Asthma, Pneumonia etc. While some of these issues heal without leaving scars, others leave scars. These scars help us know a bit about your medical history without asking too many questions (that’s why we think some doctors are magicians) and sometimes they mislead us. She later told me that if I hadn’t mentioned my Pneumonia, she’d most likely have requested for a sputum test just to be sure I didn’t have symptoms of another respiratory issue.

I walked out of her office feeling like I had a terminal disease; she had just told me I had been carrying scars within me since forever! Wow!

I got in the car and started my journey, as I made my way through the hazardous metropolis, I saw a lot of familiar places, it was my first time in this area in a long while. As I moved past buildings, my mind brought mini throwback pictures, “oh this was where I got pizza last year, LOL, I ordered two large pizzas and I was home alone” as I laughed and shook my head ah! Good times. I continued this for a very long time, most of the buildings had good memories and some, well, made me regret a few decisions.

I’ve never really understood the concept of “Forgive and Forget”. I hardly forget things, I’m really good with dates, and when it seems confusing and I can’t get the exact date, I just set an event close to that date as a bookmark in my mind, although I must confess that on some very rare occasions I actually forget people or whatever they did to me. While it’s quite easy for me to forgive people and ignore everything they did, I still randomly just remember those things, is that bad? I don’t think I’ve ever made their actions the basis for mine though. They are just scars I carry around.

I later stopped at a popular eatery to get some tummy stuffing, while I was devouring my meal, my doctor walked in, made her order and came over to my table, motioned to seat and I said “of course, it’d be lovely to have lunch with you”. She laughed and said she didn’t know if I was expecting anybody, then gave me a wink, I giggled as I replied “Single Pringle in the building” she gasped “makes two of us!” motioned for a high five I replied and we both laughed. This was the first time I was meeting her outside the office and well, she’s a really lovely person. While she waited for her order she asked a few personal questions just so we could know more about each other. She went on to tell me a bit about her and why she was still single. Now inasmuch as I tried not to get that personal, I couldn’t help it, she had the hottest legs I’d seen on any doctor, and she wasn’t as rigid as the other ones I had met at the clinic. From her story, I could deduce that she also had scars.

The waitress brought our bills, she took care of them. The waitress asked if we wanted a receipt, some need receipts to get pay back from their employers, I said yes even though I didn’t need it. We walked out together to her car and I gave her a summary of what had been going through my mind since I left her office, about scars and the concept of forgiveness. I felt she needed it; she’s one of those girls who are really careful to date because of their antecedents with other men. She still felt hurt, like the pain was still fresh. I told her that my Pneumonia healed about 20 years ago but she still saw the scars today, she smiled. I looked down at my wrist to check the time and saw the receipt still in my hand; I told her that patients were waiting but before leaving I dropped the receipt in the bin beside the parking lot and told her, “The food is gone, and so is the receipt, I don’t need to give account to anybody on how much I spent on food and I don’t need to keep reminding myself about it, so it doesn’t scar my mind about this eatery or any other. The relationships are gone, throw the receipts away”. We hugged and she drove off, I felt a tear roll down my cheek and I smiled.

culled from: www.thoughtlessmumbles.wordpress.com