Humor in the Hospital?

My first breakfast in the hospital was oatmeal cooked in unsalted water. I was in shock. “Come on. Eat at least a little of it”, my wife pleaded. “It IS nourishment, as you always told me when I had broken my hip”. The irony was dripping from her tongue. I was not amused. There are limits to what you can laugh about in the hospital, right?

Not true, though. There is a lot you can only laugh about. Read the rest of my story! Trust me. But first I must tell my physicians and nurses, if they have not found that out yet, that we patients, their bread and butter, are often a little weird. Let me rephrase this. We are rather like dogs. We do what we are told, for the most part. But then we can also hear frequencies that are out of human range. In other words, we notice things you would not dream of.

Take the picture on the wall by my hospital bed, for example. It is not just standard hospital decoration. This picture actually moves. When you lie in that bed and look up at that ocean scene the canvass slowly bulges toward you, like a huge bubble about to burst. You look away, of course, and the bubble recedes. But then it starts bulging again, but this time the bubble takes on the shape of a big rectangular box. And the TV, I notice, has now been wrapped in several layers of black garden netting such as orchard men use to keep the birds out of the cherries. Now you can argue with me all you want, but I tell you only what I see, what there is. And I am not alone in this. I have heard of people who swear that they saw their TV set covered with ants.

But to continue with my story. Yesterday Joe, my surgeon’s PA, announced that we were going to pull the drainage tube. In the hospital such things signify progress. Full of anticipation, I watched the entire procedure. This is what happened. There was a bed in the middle of the room. On it lay a carcass (me). Joe entered, dressed in a dinner jacket and white shirt. He brought with him a length of reddish garden hose which he placed on a little table and covered with a cloth. Then he pulled up his sleeves to show that his hands were empty, waved a wand over the little table, and pulled away the cloth. The garden hose was gone!

In mock-surprise he looked around and then focused on me (the carcass), stuck his hands into my belly, and began pulling out hose, hand over fist, like a fisherman dragging his net ashore. What he pulled out looked like uncooked Italian sausage. He gathered it all up, humbly accepted the applause, and then he was gone.

I also should have applauded but I was too tired. I will clap next time, however. I am sure he will do it again because the fun never stops among the Asclepians.

©2017 by Herbert H Hoffman — Picture credit: Entertainers Directory PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR MORE