Coming out even
By Paul Mantee/Special to The Malibu Times
Remember when you were a kid and put so much sugar on your Post Toasties that you got a little gritty clump in your spoon every time you scraped the bottom of the bowl? And if you didn’t get any, you felt cheated? Well, I still do. But don’t let on to my medical/dental staff. Also, if you finished the Post Toasties before the milk, you had to replenish so that everything came out even.
No?
Just me, I guess. I think that’s what’s up with my blood pressure. Everything must come out even. I’m such a tidy boy.
Never mind. I inherit the phenomenon. My mother used to triple-fold her panty hose and stack them like butterflies. My father felt pity for a twisted rubber band.
This is embarrassing. When the price of postage stamps went up to 37 cents, I bought myself exactly enough 3 cent stamps to complement the 34 centers I had left in my right-hand desk drawer, near corner. God forbid, I should have three extra cents hanging around without a destination. What’s worse, when I added that three-cent stamp to the one already on the envelope (that’s how it’s done, the big one to the right, the little one snug up), I had to line it up exactly, so my friends at the Malibu post office would know what a sweetheart I am. I’m admitting to this bizarre behavior only because I no longer do it. I’ve kicked the impulse. In fact, these days I take pains to affix the stamp askew, so folks will assume I’m devil-may-care.
The over-examined life is a pain in the artery.
So, I bought this blood pressure machine, right? At Super Care, my personal pharmacy. Eighty-seven bucks. Digital.
Purchasing one’s own blood pressure apparatus is a coming of age experience. Possibly your last. There were two units from which to choose: digital and prehistoric. The unique feature of the digital kit is that you can use it solo. All you need to do is press a little button and watch the pretty numbers go up and down (like TV) … as opposed to the ungainly “two-party” job with gauge, bladder, bulb, eartips, y-tubing, stethoscope and sphygmomanometer (try that one three times fast), second party not included. Made by the same people as the digital for a third of the price. Vaguely, I recall Gina at the register indicating the digital, though fancy and convenient, is perceived as less accurate than the cheap ugly complicated one. It makes no sense. Every hormone in my body said, go for expensive and pretty.
Proudly, I took my new toy on a field trip to my cardiologist’s office in Northridge. He admitted it was cute, then compared its function with his own professional model, and concluded mine was useless. Being kind of a loosey-goosey guy, he suggested I hang on to it, take my pressure now and then, and subtract each result by 10. Or so. No! My blood says, no way! Guesswork is not in my genetic makeup.
Doctor Jeff, my Malibu G.P., had a better idea. He practically drags me by the ear back to Super Care to exchange it for the real thing. The staff at the pharmacy responds as one might expect of an outfit that’s been keeping Malibu smiling for 37 years.
The real thing is an item of many parts, as I’ve explained, and requires a friend to play doctor. Since my habit is to double-dip whenever possible, I succeed in finding two friends, one blonde and one brunette.
First, we remove the tight fitting clothing from my upper body. I sit quietly for five minutes while friend A reads the l4-page instruction booklet aloud and friend B assembles the sphygmomanometer et al, and loops and secures the cuff.
Friend A slips what resembles a 50-cent piece under the cuff onto the brachial artery in the crook of the patient’s elbow. (It’s called a chest piece-don’t ask.) Friend B inserts the eartips of the stethoscope into the sensitive membrane of her little ears. These hurt, she says. Nevertheless, she grimaces through a procedure that includes pumping air into the cuff, letting it out gradually, studying the gauge and listening for ticks, the first and last being of significance. Friend A observes. Nothing. Nary a tick. Friends A and B reverse roles. These certainly do hurt, agrees friend A. She pumps, she listens. Nada. The patient grows impatient and a little nervous as well, and insists on trying it alone. The eartips feel like corkscrews. I can hear only my wince. Can it be I’m a stagnant pool?
Back to Super Care with an armful of apparatus. I relate my saga in detail to Steve, Suzanne, Joann and Gina. They cease all activity, listen attentively and don’t quite laugh-a sensitivity I appreciate. Joann scurries from the recesses of the pharmacy. She sits me down, she wraps and she pumps. Obviously, the stethoscope does not punish her ears, I can tell by the smile in her eyes. She reports she hears several ticks. Try it, she says, cheerfully. Meanwhile, Steve, Mr. Super Care himself, whips out from behind the pharmacy counter. Kindly, he takes me by the arm and leads me to the far northeast nook of the building. It’s quiet there. He puts the sharp little eartips into my ears. I pretend they don’t hurt, and he performs the procedure. “I hear it,” I enthuse. “A ring, a pause and another ring.”
“That’s the phone, putz,” Steve says. He listens professionally, looks at me somberly. “I hear it and it’s high.”
Well, of course it’s high! My blood refuses to acknowledge me and I’m fighting back.
Suzanne phones Doctor Jeff on the spot and sets up an appointment first thing in the morning to show me how to follow directions. He agrees with the gang at Super Care. My pressure is over the moon. Furthermore, he refers me to Horton and Converse in town to purchase a stethoscope for morons, and I say the hell with it. I decide merely to calm down, use my sphygmomanometer as a paperweight and to reprioritize my life. The following week, I visit my cardiologist in Northridge, and he informs me that I’m 120 over 70-a teenager. I’ve stopped worrying about my blood pressure and it’s stopped worrying about me. Also, I’ve given up control of things inconsequential, and apparently it’s paying off.
By the way, harking back to my original point, I’m sure everyone who’s read this far is aware of the proper way to install a roll of toilet paper into its wall space …