Feb 22 2012
One of Them
Generally, we like to think that we are a little better than the common man. We aren’t the Ugly American tourists giving our great country a bad name. We aren’t tourists at all! We are citizens of the world. But sometimes, we have to face the fact that we are, in fact, the Ugly American tourist, fanny pack and all, speaking English loudly and slowly enough* for those silly foreigners to get it**.
Yesterday, I had to face the fact that I am One of Them.
One of the many, uh, challenges Megan faces at work in the ER is people who come in saying they’ve had back pain or whatever for a month, but they need treatment NOW. Yes, they’ve had it for weeks and could have gone to the clinic or seen their doctor, but instead chose to go to the Emergency Room at night and get in the way of traffic accident victims and people having babies or heart attacks.
The ER staff does not look kindly upon such individuals.
Yesterday, my fever and chills were so bad that I called Megan at work, thoughtfully placing the call about five minutes after her shift started. She calmed me down and said she’d tell Rob what to bring me.
Rob appeared with Tylenol with codeine (later, I noticed that it had been prescribed for one of my mother’s dogs, who died a couple of years ago), cough syrup, and ibuprophen. He also thoughtfully brought their coffeemaker, which he will repo later on today when Megan wakes up.
I took all these things and shiveringly watched “Pan Am” until Megan called to check up on me. This morning, I feel a little better – though not enough to go to work – and as I came downstairs, Megan arrived, bearing ginger ale and soup and hugs. I may be sick, but I’m still lucky.
*My father believed that there was absolutely no point in speaking a foreign language abroad unless you were fluent in it, since offering a word or two in the other person’s native language simply unleashed a flood of it which you couldn’t understand, thus creating a conversational impasse.
**I always loved that line in “Big Trouble in Little China” (filmed in San Francisco!) where James Hong says, “Shut up! You are not brought upon this world to get it! “