The Gift of the Magi 2014 (or Adventures in ER Land) Revisited

Editor's Note: Not sure why, but I was thinking of this guy in the early hours the other morning. Although it's been over three years now, it reminded of this verse:

Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

- Matthew 25: 40


For anyone not acquainted with O. Henry's short story, "The Gift of the Magi", stop what you are doing and go straight here, and do not come back until you have finished it. You will not regret it. If are you familiar with it, but haven't read it in a long time, same goes for you. This will still be here when you get back.

I had a precious little gift of my own last week: an all expense paid visit to the ER! I was going to write about it last Friday and then the horrific murder of two policeman changed the focus of what I wanted to say. But, the players remain the same: two of Stockton's finest in blue, ER docs, representative of the evil, non government hospital, in white, a homeless man, and a keen observer of the human condition. (Okay, he was kicked out of the ER for loitering and then it was just up to me to take notes.)

It was the first time I'd been to an ER during the week, when things are relatively quiet. Typically, I'd be there on a weekend, like everybody else, because I didn't have access to my regular physician, and, well, it was an emergency. In fact, I had a great deal of déjà vu in driving myself there. Just before I moved to Ohio, I had driven myself to the very same ER, with a rapidly beating heart and pains in my left arm. The pain in my arm, it turned out, was coincidental to all the packing and moving I was doing, but, because that and my first ever bout with A-fib, I got moved to the front of a very long line of folk in the ER that weekend.

This time, there were may be a dozen people there, and a lot of them were friends and families of those actually needing medical treatment, still, there was a lot of "hurry up and wait". I didn't mind, since I was familiar with how the triage system works and my injuries were far from life threatening this time, so I waited. And waited. USW*

After waiting in one place, they invited me to wait in another, this time on a gurney in the hallway. So, I waited a little more. They had some of those portable curtain screens around, but there wasn't much call for them. Then, a couple of Stockton's finest and a couple of docs escorted this guy with no pants to sit on the gurney closest to mine. I tried not to eavesdrop, but by this time I was ready to read soup labels for entertainment.

It was apparently a homeless guy. Straight out of Central Casting, he had long scraggly hair and a long unkempt beard...and no pants. From what I was able to piece together his story, he'd been brought to the hospital four days before with some kind of seizure. His clothing and meager possessions had been stuffed into a plastic bag, per hospital policy. And now, he wanted to leave. Apparently in no uncertain terms he wanted to leave. My guess is, that he raised some kind of ruckus with the nurses, which explained the presence of the two police officers, who did not bring him in but were called because of the nature and volume of his impending departure.

The police officers both drew their night sticks and beat him mercilessly, shouting racial epithets in rhythm with the blows. Of course not. BTW, I haven't mentioned anyone's race or gender here (besides the homeless guy), and won't. It's irrelevant. The police and the doctors both explained that they could not keep him here against his will, but they were concerned for his well being after he leaves the hospital. It was remarked that he was weak, and could hardly walk, had no residence to return to, but he insisted he wanted to go to a "friend's house".

The police were there to ensure the safety of the staff, in case this gentleman went beyond violent outbursts to violent action. There were also there to see to his well being, and convince him, if they could, to stay under the hospital's care until he was better equipped to handle things on his own.

Let me remind you at this point, that the man was homeless. He had no insurance. He had no money to pay, yet here this money grubbing, non-government hospital who might charge you $20 for a pack of Pampers was offering to let this man, who had been with them for four days, without paying a cent, to stay for an indefinite time longer.

No one has to go without health care in America.

But, he'd made up his mind. In a way, I can't blame him. I'd been there for four hours and pretty much had seen everything I wanted to. He'd been there four days. He determined to go, against doctor's recommendation. His bare feet were stuck in running shoes. "Could we give you a pair of socks?" they asked, and someone went off running to fetch him a pair of socks. This was Winter in California. Maybe forty degrees outside. Not bad by comparison to much of the country, but then, most of the country has some place to go home to.

It was around 11:30 AM. "How about lunch? Can we get you something to eat before you go?" Again,one of the orderlies was dispatched to find the man something to eat, that he could take with him.

So now he had fresh, clean dry socks, lunch, courtesy of the hospital and, did I mention he wasn't wearing pants? In California in the winter time, it doesn't snow through much of the state, but it does rain. We'd been having a number of big rainstorms lately, and when he was brought in, he'd been brought in soaking wet. And his pants? Put into the plastic bag in the condition they were brought in. Wet. They hadn't gotten any drier or cleaner in the last four days. So now, he has clean dry socks, a meal and wet pants to go off walking about in 40 to 50 degree weather.

After a brief discussion of the feasibility of laundering his clothes, it was another command decision: "Can we get him a pair of hospital pants?" And again, someone provided him with, shall we say, less than ideal winter wear...thin and hardly fashionable, but clean and dry. They put the partitions around him to give him a little privacy while he dressed.

"Where does your friend live?" The guy was a little vague. I suspect his elevator doesn't go all the way to the top floor, if you know what I mean. The doctor says, "Let me get you a bus pass. Here's two. I don't want you to have to do a lot of walking."

The elderly gentleman thanked him and they escorted him as far as the parking lot, clutching his meager possessions, his lunch and sporting a snazzy blue pair of pants. A hard life just got a tiny bit easier, for a while, anyway. Thanks in large part to the kind of hospital that Barack Obama would do away with. Thanks in part to a couple of police officers who wanted to make sure that this individual did not harm himself or anyone else.

The next time some hospital bills you $24 for a box of Kleenex you could have picked up at Costco for a buck, just remember that the excess isn't necessarily going towards the head doctor's next Lexus payment. It helps cover the costs of those who pay nothing at all, like our friend here. The gifts of the Magi were clean socks, and a lunch and some crummy blue pants, given in the Spirit of Christmas.

Merry Christmas to all!

Oh, and me? Hurt my arm. Tore something. Very painful, but nothing I can't handle. Will be typing with one hand for the foreseeable future. Thanks for asking! (You know you were!)





* USW: "Um So Weiter", German for "et cetera". See? You didn't think you were going to learn anything today!


Originally published 12/24/14

The Other Gift of the Magi

It's nearly Christmas. No, not when I'm writing this, but when it will see the light of day. It's July and I'm slipping this into a time capsule for revival when the frost is on the bumpkins and the chestnuts are in the fire.

When I was a lad, about eight or nine, as I recall, twelve tops, we were living in southern Indiana. Jeffersonville. (Hopefully Thomas and not Davis, or the PC crowd will change it!) One year, my older brother (bother in the first draft. Typo or Freudian?) and sister saw a design in some magazine for some handmade, do-it-yourself jewelry. Earrings, pins, necklaces... something like that. I vaguely remember they were made out of cork balls and a little bit of black velvet ribbon and pins through glass beads.
(Actually, they kind of put me in mind of those old WWII sea mines with all the spikes all over them, but very colorful and festive! )

I was the youngest of we three and not terrible suited for production. The big kids handled that. I was in sales. I was youngest and thereby the cutest of the bunch. (No brag, just fact!) So I was delegated to go door to door in the cold December winds and sell these bits of jewelry and perhaps some clumps of mistletoe as well, tied up with red curling ribbon.

Anyhow, out into the cruel December winter trudged I, with a sack or a wagon or some such, I don't recall, full of Christmacy merchandise to sell. 'Tis the season! My siblings had set the prices (marketing) and as I recall I did pretty well the first couple of houses. By the time I got to about the third door, the homeowner must have startled me, or I was nervous about talking to strangers, because when they opened the door they demanded "how much for the small jewelry?" For, you see, there were two sizes, a large and a small, appropriately priced, the larger sizes more than the smaller. Higher labor and material costs, don'tcha know?

For some reason, I got rattled and recited the large jewelry price for the smaller jewelry. Before I could correct myself, the homeowner agreed, paid the price and I was on my way before I fully realized what had happened. Our goods were underpriced for what the market would bear! Since I was the only member of the corporation onsite, I gave myself a small promotion to Joint marketing and Sales, and proceeded to quote the higher prices for the rest of the day.

Now as a kid, I was always good at math, and I knew how many units I had started out with and how many I had sold, and at what prices. So I subtracted the original price of the merchandise, and put the difference into pocket number one. The rest of the money went into pocket number two. Upon my return, cold, slightly frostbitten and hungry, I gave my siblings the entire contents of pocket number two.

They were delighted! Look how much money they had made, from the warmth and comfort of their own living room no less! As management, they then divided up the profits and gave me my share. An honest wage for an honest day's work! I'm sure they were thinking what a chump I was to work all day in the cold and how smart they were to have talked me into it!

I was then rewarded with a bonus for being 'Salesman of the Year', with the content of pocket number one. The awards ceremony was intimate, restricted solely to the sales force, without whom the company would not long survive.

I can't remember if I've ever told this story to my brother or sister. I'm pretty sure the statute of limitations has run out. Think I'll print this out and put it in their Christmas cards. If I live 'til New Years, I'll let you know how that worked out!

The Gift of the Magi 2014 (or Adventures in ER Land)

For anyone not acquainted with O. Henry's short story, "The Gift of the Magi", stop what you are doing and go straight here, and do not come back until you have finished it. You will not regret it. If are you familiar with it, but haven't read it in a long time, same goes for you. This will still be here when you get back.

I had a precious little gift of my own last week: an all expense paid visit to the ER! I was going to write about it last Friday and then the horrific murder of two policeman changed the focus of what I wanted to say. But, the players remain the same: two of Stockton's finest in blue, ER docs, representative of the evil, non government hospital, in white, a homeless man, and a keen observer of the human condition. (Okay, he was kicked out of the ER for loitering and then it was just up to me to take notes.)

It was the first time I'd been to an ER during the week, when things are relatively quiet. Typically, I'd be there on a weekend, like everybody else, because I didn't have access to my regular physician, and, well, it was an emergency. In fact, I had a great deal of déjà vu in driving myself there. Just before I moved to Ohio, I had driven myself to the very same ER, with a rapidly beating heart and pains in my left arm. The pain in my arm, it turned out, was coincidental to all the packing and moving I was doing, but, because that and my first ever bout with A-fib, I got moved to the front of a very long line of folk in the ER that weekend.

This time, there were may be a dozen people there, and a lot of them were friends and families of those actually needing medical treatment, still, there was a lot of "hurry up and wait". I didn't mind, since I was familiar with how the triage system works and my injuries were far from life threatening this time, so I waited. And waited. USW*

After waiting in one place, they invited me to wait in another, this time on a gurney in the hallway. So, I waited a little more. They had some of those portable curtain screens around, but there wasn't much call for them. Then, a couple of Stockton's finest and a couple of docs escorted this guy with no pants to sit on the gurney closest to mine. I tried not to eavesdrop, but by this time I was ready to read soup labels for entertainment.

It was apparently a homeless guy. Straight out of Central Casting, he had long scraggly hair and a long unkempt beard...and no pants. From what I was able to piece together his story, he'd been brought to the hospital four days before with some kind of seizure. His clothing and meager possessions had been stuffed into a plastic bag, per hospital policy. And now, he wanted to leave. Apparently in no uncertain terms he wanted to leave. My guess is, that he raised some kind of ruckus with the nurses, which explained the presence of the two police officers, who did not bring him in but were called because of the nature and volume of his impending departure.

The police officers both drew their night sticks and beat him mercilessly, shouting racial epithets in rhythm with the blows. Of course not. BTW, I haven't mentioned anyone's race or gender here (besides the homeless guy), and won't. It's irrelevant. The police and the doctors both explained that they could not keep him here against his will, but they were concerned for his well being after he leaves the hospital. It was remarked that he was weak, and could hardly walk, had no residence to return to, but he insisted he wanted to go to a "friend's house".

The police were there to ensure the safety of the staff, in case this gentleman went beyond violent outbursts to violent action. There were also there to see to his well being, and convince him, if they could, to stay under the hospital's care until he was better equipped to handle things on his own.

Let me remind you at this point, that the man was homeless. He had no insurance. He had no money to pay, yet here this money grubbing, non-government hospital who might charge you $20 for a pack of Pampers was offering to let this man, who had been with them for four days, without paying a cent, to stay for an indefinite time longer.

No one has to go without health care in America.

But, he'd made up his mind. In a way, I can't blame him. I'd been there for four hours and pretty much had seen everything I wanted to. He'd been there four days. He determined to go, against doctor's recommendation. His bare feet were stuck in running shoes. "Could we give you a pair of socks?" they asked, and someone went off running to fetch him a pair of socks. This was Winter in California. Maybe forty degrees outside. Not bad by comparison to much of the country, but then, most of the country has some place to go home to.

It was around 11:30 AM. "How about lunch? Can we get you something to eat before you go?" Again,one of the orderlies was dispatched to find the man something to eat, that he could take with him.

So now he had fresh, clean dry socks, lunch, courtesy of the hospital and, did I mention he wasn't wearing pants? In California in the winter time, it doesn't snow through much of the state, but it does rain. We'd been having a number of big rainstorms lately, and when he was brought in, he'd been brought in soaking wet. And his pants? Put into the plastic bag in the condition they were brought in. Wet. They hadn't gotten any drier or cleaner in the last four days. So now, he has clean dry socks, a meal and wet pants to go off walking about in 40 to 50 degree weather.

After a brief discussion of the feasibility of laundering his clothes, it was another command decision: "Can we get him a pair of hospital pants?" And again, someone provided him with, shall we say, less than ideal winter wear...thin and hardly fashionable, but clean and dry. They put the partitions around him to give him a little privacy while he dressed.

"Where does your friend live?" The guy was a little vague. I suspect his elevator doesn't go all the way to the top floor, if you know what I mean. The doctor says, "Let me get you a bus pass. Here's two. I don't want you to have to do a lot of walking."

The elderly gentleman thanked him and they escorted him as far as the parking lot, clutching his meager possessions, his lunch and sporting a snazzy blue pair of pants. A hard life just got a tiny bit easier, for a while, anyway. Thanks in large part to the kind of hospital that Barack Obama would do away with. Thanks in part to a couple of police officers who wanted to make sure that this individual did not harm himself or anyone else.

The next time some hospital bills you $24 for a box of Kleenex you could have picked up at Costco for a buck, just remember that the excess isn't necessarily going towards the head doctor's next Lexus payment. It helps cover the costs of those who pay nothing at all, like our friend here. The gifts of the Magi were clean socks, and a lunch and some crummy blue pants, given in the Spirit of Christmas.

Merry Christmas to all!

Oh, and me? Hurt my arm. Tore something. Very painful, but nothing I can't handle. Will be typing with one hand for the foreseeable future. Thanks for asking! (You know you were!)





* "Um so weiter": German for "et cetera". See? You didn't think you were going to learn anything today!