Get Your Garmin

"It tastes.... like, chemicals." I say out loud in my empty apartment.

Nothing but disappointment and I share this bitter moment together, as my beer induced curled-lip frown slowly fades away. Unfortunately, the taste lingers far longer than the stupid look on my face.

"Six weeks." I utter, with bitterness that nears the level of my failed beer.

It took six weeks from boil, to bottle... to get the crappiest tasting beer that has ever coursed across my tongue. It was simply undrinkable.

I don't know what went wrong.... whether I contaminated it during the fermentation, or if the sterilizing mix didn't get rinsed out properly, or if I managed to screw up the recipe during the boil somehow.

I guess it's all moot at this point, what matters to me, while stuck motionless in my kitchen... still staring at this flavor-forsaken, anti-freeze tasting home-brew, is that it sucks.... bad.

However, after getting some advice, I've learned that it's possible, (though unlikely) that my windex-infused ale just might need a few more weeks "bottle conditioning." Well, alright then.... all I have to do is wait.

Waiting and I have, if not gotten along quite well over the years, at least grown accustomed to each other, for, I am patient. Or, at least I can feign patience.

I've spent many tortured hours in malls, holding purses.... or stuck in traffic, tempering my temper.... waiting for my love to get ready for our dinner reservation that was 20 minutes ago, or keeping my cool when the computer decides to freeze up at the most inopportune of moments. All the while my insides scream out so loud that I'm sure someone could hear, or somehow see the pain bubbling over; but they never do. They never discover my secret, that I am a fake.

But, maybe that's all patience really is; pretending to be patient. I think that patience, by definition, requires some inner turmoil; when your mind screams out in frustration, but your outward appearance remains cool. Because without something to get you all hot and bothered, you wouldn't HAVE to be patient.... you would just, be.

It's like overwhelmed.... can you be just whelmed? I think not. Whelmed isn't even a word. And, to me, that is weird.

Anyway, that's alright with me, I can do that; pretend... but, today I noticed the first signs of my inner impatience bursting through the confines of my own personal world, and into my very public actions.

Someone caught me.

I walked into a patient's room today, sat down, and asked why they came to the ER. And, after explaining what a PA is, and what I do, (and for the very first time in my career, had to verbally judo someone into allowing me to see them, instead of "the doctor") the long and convoluted story began.... none of which could even begin to answer my first, well, my ONLY question of "What brings you to the ER today?" Before I had the chance to interrupt this person, and redirect them into a more useful course for the conversation, so I could understand why they were there, and thereby narrow down my options from doing a full-body scan, and a compete smattering of blood tests, their cell phone rings, which they proceed to pick up, and have a full conversation with their family member. "Yes, I'm in the hospital....... yea, no, I fell........... I don't know, there's a guy here..... who are you again????" "Chris." (sigh) "well, he's asking me a bunch of questions....." (I asked one) and it goes on for a while longer before I simply stand up, and walk out of the room, without words...

I. Need. To. Leave.

before I explode from pure and total frustration.

Why are you here? = my back hurts
how long has it hurt? = 1 day
did you have some sort of trauma? = no

I wish it was this simple... i wish people could just tell me what I needed to know, with me asking open-ended questions, like we were taught in school..... but we can't.... and, if it were only as easy as above. OH, that would be sweet.

I can't say it's like pulling teeth, because that would be easier than this. Much of the time, I can ask simple yes or no questions....or things like, "better or worse?" ...and get nothing... well, in fact, worse than nothing... I get a whole lot of words that equate to nothing close to an answer that addresses my question. So, I ask again.... is it BETTER, WORSE or the SAME? Like I'm talking to a 2 year old....

But somehow, I've managed to fake patience with my patients. I seem very calm, caring and level headed.... empathetic even. Not today.... I just walked out, without a word. Before I could get more than a few steps out the door, the patient calls out to me, "Hey, are you leaving?!?!"

"Well, yes, I have other patients here that I need to take care of." I say, very curtly.

"Wait, hold on.... I've got to go, he's getting mad at me.... ok, bye."

I wish we didn't allow cell phones in the ER.... this is not the first time this has happened to me, but usually, they answer, and tell whoever it is, "hey, the doctor's here, i'll call you back." -click-

Not this one.... there would have been a full on conversation while i stood there like a moron, waiting. So I left... or tried. Then, I think my patient realized how they had upset me.... it's not that they had realized that they were being rude or inappropriate, but instead, that they pissed me off.

So, in an instant, I bottle up my frustration, like my failed beer, and let it sit.... I turn around, and walk back in, kneel down at the bedside.... With my hands resting on the hospital bed, I apologize for making the patient feel as if she'd upset me. I say in a very empathetic tone, that I understand that her family is just worried about her, and that it's important to keep them informed.

I then finished the interview and physical in a much more directed manner, with leading questions and statements like, "You're not having chest pain today, no?"

My inner-carbonation began to settle as I took control of the conversation, and then left the room in the usual, much calmer, manner. But, it's still volatile. Nearly failing in an instant, it barely passed this test. In time, I will find out if my newly weakened veneer will regain its prior fortress status, or if it will crack and poison my insides, like a solitary bacteria in a fermenting batch of beer.... growing, reproducing and turning a clean and crisp Pale Ale into a death soup.

And, as for my real beer? Well, it needs a couple more weeks to mellow out.... and then I can test it again. Hopefully, not unlike my impatience, it will calm, and morph into something palatable... something respectable. For now, on both fronts, the direction is still unclear.