The Cameraderie of the Waiting Room

Today I spent seven hours in the waiting room on the coronary floor of a major Boston hospital. I accompanied someone who had a "procedure." Has anyone but me noticed that hospitals now use that word, "procedure" as an all encompassing word--anything from an angioplasty to a colonoscopy. Why don't we call it what it is? Procedure? Offices have procedures, like for a customer order in the mail. Organizations have policies and procedures. Cooking from a recipe is a procedure. So what's with the hospital weirdspeak?

I took along a book about writing mysteries, the latest Bon Appetit and The Warlord's Son as reading matter, but first dug into the NY Times and then a Cosmo that was in the waiting room, so now I am up on all the techniques to make your boyfriend happy, as well as cook him a helluva good meal. According to Cosmo, the way to a man's heart is no longer through his stomach, and pot roast is barely mentioned. I won't be disingenous and say "who knew?"

Back to the hospital. The patient I was escorting came in with a trio of elderly sisters, one of whom was having the same "procedure," and I thought it was pretty cool that they both came to offer moral support and a keen driver. The other patient in "our" group was a man who didn't look over 40. I always think this is stuff for old folks. The variety of ring tones of the cell phones in the waiting room was as astonishing as they were loud.

A sextet of handsome dark-haired young men came in and waited to visit someone. They looked like the Lowell hockey boys I saw a couple years ago. What is it about dark and handsome and careless? Ah well.

A tearful young lady came in and snuffled into a box of tissues for a couple of hours until her family came. Pretty sure someone died, but not sure who. Whole big family arrived and wept. Felt very sad for all of them. Realized if it was me, there wouldn't be a room full of people, or even a trio, due to all family being away from this area and not that big of a family anymore.

A good friend of ours was buried today, who did have family around in her last hours. There's been a whole rash of deaths which is terribly depressing. Didn't feel like reading the Warlord's Son, but it finally came to that, as I had whipped thru the mystery writing book in a couple hours. The authors constantly refered to "your word processor," which sounded so dated.

So, the coronary unit is not a happy place, but my friend's outcome was good and I drove the patient home from the hospital. Tonight is leftover eggplant/chicken parm, the best of all possible parms. And red wine, of course. To keep the arteries clear. One thinks about such things after a day in the coronary unit.

So let's be nice to each other this evening. Spring needs a little nudge. Maybe some light joshing and a few smiles will hasten the good weather. You never know.