Shorter, Fatter, AND Inflamed

Nothing makes me more aware of the swift passage of time than the due date of the Annual Medical Physical.

You've just barely inhaled the last of your cigarette from the last assault, and it's time to strip down to your birthday suit and do it all again.

Sitting on the edge of a cold steel bed in the early evening hours on the cusp of the weekend provoked me to remind my Doctor Man; "just remember. This was your idea, not mine."

Clearly, it wasn't my idea to march down that long hallway and be commanded to board the unforgiving scale, with it's bits of metal making industrial, judgemental "clunk, clunk, snicker, snivel" sorts of sounds. A heavy sigh from the assistant while she reads the condemning number aloud; "One-hundred-eight-zillion-and-seven-pound-something-or-other. Humph."

A full three zillion units heavier than I am at home, stark naked, four AM, without food or water in twelve revolutions of the planets.

After that, she brings the measure-a-doodie down to see if I'm still five foot seven inches, like my drivers lisence has so accurately stated since 1984. I've never given it a second thought, except that in recent years, my daughters have disputed my height. Know-it-all show off-ers that they are.

Minutes later, shivering in the "privacy" of my own metal chamber, I eye the measuring tape mounted to the wall. Knowing that the Doctor will likely be doing numerous cataract surgeries, heart transplants, and lesion excisions before he remembers my thighs wrapped in transparent blue, I decide to hop down and do some measuring of my own.

I've apparently shrunk.
I'm not 5'7" at all, but 5'6".

Beginning to suspect that I'm evolving into a bouncey dollar store ball without any bounce left, I slither over to the meanacing scale in the corner.
Climb aboard.
Pile my various rolls and straying bits around me and glance down at the numerical sentence.

Holy $%#@.
Shorter.
AND fatter.

Roughly around the time that my road map of blue-ish veins begin to crystalize in the subarctic walk-in closet that I find myself in, the Doc makes his heroic fully clothed appearance. I have by this point, searched through his cupboards for mints, lotion, menthols, and/or sedatives. And come up with
Nothing.

And there's still the full invasion to look forward to.

But then I remember how I really like that low lamp that Doctors favour in their cozy metal offices. The ones with the swivelly heads that can be twisted and turned to shine in the most ingenious places.

I love those super long Q-tips that they employ.

The cold jelly.

The latex gloves.

And in the midnight hours before turning forty-three, I just love hearing words like "inflammation".

Ah, well. I was about to say that it could be worse, but that already happened last year.