By Jim Hagarty
I was tired when I woke up Tuesday. I had spent all day Monday digging my own grave. A friend has the key to the cemetery, so he let me in. Even lent me a shovel.
All this activity was in preparation for a medical appointment yesterday at 10 a.m. I have known about this visit for some time now, a couple of months at least. And each day, as I thought about it, the prognosis from the medical professional sitting before me seemed to get worse and worse.
“Routine checkup”, I came to believe, is a medical term for “pull the plug.”
Each day I sat in my backyard, awaiting the end. At first, the likely outcome of the appointment seemed to be a bunch of unpleasant changes in my lifestyle. Then, day by day, sitting in my lawnchair under the maple tree the kids gave me a long time ago, things somehow went from unpleasant to downright horrifying. I looked around the yard with a mixture of fondness and sadness, tearing up at times, thinking about how much I would miss this place. So many memories. The swing set, the plastic swimming pool, dragging the kids around on a plastic tarp, the skating rinks.
Yesterday I was up early. I showered and stuffed myself into what in my world can be considered my “good clothes.” I drove myself casually to the medical office, wondering if I would be driving myself home. But I was relatively calm. Sort of resigned to my fate.
I sat in the waiting room. Didn’t even crack open a magazine. What would be the point of reading about the first manned mission to Mars if I will not be around to see it. Dieting tips? Too late. Relationship advice. Hah!
“Mr. Hagarty?” came the call from the man in the white coat. “Come this way.”
I would have liked to have hugged the receptionist goodbye but there was no time.
“Have a seat,” said the medic sternly. He started shuffling through my records, looking concerned. Let’s just get this over with, I thought.
“Well, your tests are fine,” said the medical professional seated before me. “Just keep doing what you’ve been doing.
“I’d like to see you again in six months.”
I floated my way out of the medical centre, as though on a cushion of air. Hardly said goodbye to the receptionist. Didn’t need her any more.
I went home and sat in my lawnchair under the tree the kids gave me and looked around.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry.
So I did a little of both.
