story # 9

underpants

by bob gottlieb

copyright © 1992-2012 Bob Gottlieb, all rights reserved.

"Take off your clothes.  Just leave on your underpants and put this robe on with the opening to the front please,” she said.  I assume my face showed her a picture that displayed either a lack of understanding or defiance, because the nurse then said rather sharply, "What's the matter?"

"I can't do that." I said.

"Why not?" she said giving me a look distended with annoyed impatience that probably reflected a long hot summer's day at work.

"I don't have any underpants to leave on."

This caused her to pause and look at me with questions, disdain, and with disbelief at the same time.  "You don't have any underwear on?"

Even though I knew it was a rhetorical question, my head nodded in agreement as I waited for her to continue.

The workings of her mind were showing in her dark eyes and causing lines to flicker across her forehead.  "No underwear?....  Why not?” as if this were confirmation of the fact that Western Civilization as we know it was perhaps about to mirror the fall of Rome and the next step would be feeding Christians  (maybe it would be some other group such as the women's libbers or pro-choicers) to the lions, or maybe in this modern day the neo-Nazis.  This distasteful morsel of information about people who ‘should’ be wearing, but weren't wearing underwear, was just the confirming of the deep-seated decadence she knew was running rampant out there.  It was another shovel full of dirt on the mound of the grave that would contain the end of all that was 'good and decent'.  Perhaps it was more serious than merely the end of Western Civilization, and verily just the tip of an iceberg of moral decay that could be the harbinger that the end of the world was imminent, and all the modern advances of medicine, technology, and civilization could do nothing to prevent it's demise.

Then she took a longer and harder look at me as if to see if I was trying to pull some elaborate hoax upon her.  That was it, a big mind game at the expense of the hard working nurse that was feeling a little dull at the end of a long, hot, annoying day.  No way!  Civilization could not have degenerated to this level without there being more advanced warnings.  After all only the most downtrodden of the poor and the homeless maybe, just maybe, couldn't afford underwear, isn't that correct?  She examined minutely the clothing I was wearing and you could see the prices and conditions of the articles of clothing registering in her calculator mind and she could tell that I didn't fit either of those two categories.  Then another thought illuminated her countenance and she examined me with a modicum more attention to the details, her eyes doing a new inquiry of my clothing and my face,

"Are you a rock musician?" 

My head nodded in the negative.

"I know, you're an.... artist?"

The nodding of my head never ceased.

Bamm, you could see an explosion of enlightenment suddenly dawn on her face as her eyes became clear with the righteousness of conviction and the shift of focus from me to the room was abrupt.  Her eyes began to interrogate the room with the intensity of attention of an expert lawyer drawing forth-grudging admissions from a reluctant witness.  Probing into all the corners and fixtures with exorbitant persistence, not a germ nor a dust ball evading her severe inquisition.  A half smile that was very uncertain was playing catch with her lips.  Her manner became coy and coquettish and she came closer to me and leaned her face close to mine.

Now I wasn't sure about what was percolating through her mind.  She crept right up to my ear with her mouth and with her right hand holding on to an elbow pressure point so I couldn't move away from her, she whispered softly in my ear, "Where is it?  I can't find it.  And how did you get it in here? .... This is my space!"

I pulled back as far as her arm would allow me and I looked at her and said,  "Where is what?"

"Shhh.  Don't play with me, where is it?" her grip tightened fractionally.

"What are you looking for?"  I said again trying to escape her breathy whisper.

"Don't fool with me.  It's not nice, and besides I'm just trying to do my job." she said keeping her voice down.  I could tell from the way her eyes were still frantically searching the room, and the increased pressure on my arm showed she was getting more frantic. Her eyes darted, as might those of a raccoon backed into a corner by a pack of dogs in full voice, examining its surroundings for any avenue of escape.

I too was beginning to get more anxious.  I mean here I was at the doctor's office for a routine physical that my work required of me and I was in the iron grasp of a disturbed psycho nurse.  She was honing a fine edge on my nerves with her vehement fervor.  I am not an enthusiastic participant in doctor's office visits at the best of times.   I find the doctors, as a general rule, too pompous and unwilling to admit that they make mistakes, afraid to say that they are not Gods.  I much prefer an acupuncturist to treat any maladies I might have.  The one I visit, when there is need, is quite willing to listen to the whole story and then ask probing questions so that he can treat more than the symptom and get to the basal cause of the imbalance. He will sometimes say this is a matter for a physician, because he can't do anything for me.

"I know I'm right now.  I recognize you!  I just can't find where you've hidden the equipment.  You really play your part well.  I thought you were a real patient, dead on convincing."  Still there was no let up of the pressure on my elbow, and her eyes had not stopped searching the room.

It suddenly dawned on me who and what she thought I was, but I couldn't follow the path of the reasoning leading to the conclusions she had drawn.  It had never occurred to me that it was weird, decadent, or uncivilized not to wear underwear.  It definitely was a lot more comfortable as far as I was concerned.  Now don't get me wrong that I never wear it, but about 99% of the time I am without it.  When I am going on a movie set to portray some character and thus going to be in clothes others have worn, even though they have been cleaned, I wear underpants.  If it’s very cold outside I will don undergarments because it keeps me much warmer.  I would have to say those are the only two reasons I can think of at the moment that cause me to slip into the undergarments that most seem to find so indispensable to their lives.  Stop and think right now how much time you spend adjusting and readjusting your undergarments, how many times some that just didn’t sit right with the clothing you were wearing has chaffed you.  Think now how entertaining it is to those behind you as you walk down the street readjusting your underpants because they are riding up, pinching, or bunching up on you.  There is always that funny and over long step that pauses in mid air as the person reaches around behind and below their butt and grasps their underpants and pulls them down.  Men as well as women.  However I digress.

So, she thought she was on candid camera.  There must be some way to use that bit of delicious information to my advantage.  "You're right, just act natural." I told her.  She immediately straightened up and started to reassume her posture as a professional nurse.  I did have to jiggle my elbow so she would release the persuasive grip she still maintained unconsciously upon it.  She grinned ruefully at me as if she were embarrassed.

           "Sorry." she said softly as she now handed me the robe to put on.  "Yell when you are ready for the Doctor to come in." and she turned and left the room, giving me a conspiratorial nod of the head.  I think if she had given me a wink I would have lost it entirely.

             After the Doctor had given me the required physical, and I was dressed she came back in, her eyes were still sweeping the room for the hidden apparatus.  She stopped and looked at me expectantly as if I had some magic trick to perform.  I just gazed at her and asked if that was it.  She said it was and walked me to the door.  I think she was prepared to walk me out to the car, hold the door open until I was comfortably inside, and then shut it for me.  However, I still was leery of her reactions and wanted witnesses around when I broke the news that she wasn't on Candid Camera.  I knew it was going to provoke a reaction from her.  My elbow still retained the memory of the pressure of her forceps like grip.

I asked her, "Do you watch over all your patients so carefully?"

She paused, and began to reach for my arm again. I took an evasive step, which prevented her from reaching her goal, and inflicting more pain.

"There is no camera.  There is no microphone.  I don't wear underwear for 2 reasons.  The first is I am far more comfortable without them.”  Here I paused for a double beat.  “The second reason I don't wear underwear is because the whole time I was growing up my mother was always harping at me to wear clean underwear just in case I was in an accident.  This way I don't have to worry about rescue workers thinking less of me because of dirty underwear."  I quickly backed out the door and shut it after me, still not trusting her.  As I walked rapidly to my truck I was still rubbing that sore spot on my elbow, and thinking about nurses, and nurse Ratchet and others we read about.  How again if my mother's advice had been listened to...

 

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