Closer Than Stink On Poo

You know how life is never easy for Val Thevictorian? That's a rhetorical question. I don't expect you all to chant, "Yessssss..."

I chose that row of three seats at Mom's doctor's office specifically to limit interaction with people. You never know how long the doctor will take, and the longer the doctor takes, the more weirdos try to pierce Val's armor, invade her air space, encroach upon her bubble.

We were there an hour and fifteen minutes all together. Here's a little picture of time standing still.

This is right after Mom got called in, leaving me with that rabbit/koala bear on the arm of the chair. I could have chosen to sit on that row across from me. Except that I didn't feel like being clobbered by that giant clock if the New Madrid Fault suddenly decided to engage in its long-overdue shenanigans. Yeah. I might have mentioned before that I'm a lot like Meryl Streep as Aunt Josephine in her house of imagined horrors perched precariously on that cliff overlooking Lake Lachrymose in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events.

No, I did not choose that row of chairs, because it is right around the corner from where people get off the elevator. It's in a direct line with the hallway leading down to the check-in windows of several doctors. I did not want people traipsing past my tootsies, breathing their germ-laden breath in my face. I figured that if I sat on the opposite wall, surely people would be walking past those other chairs, evening out their path to the middle of the hall, giving me my desired personal space. You know what happens when we figure. We make a fig out of u and re. Wait. I might have that saying messed up a little bit.

Yeah. I was all the way across that five-to-six-foot gap, but the sick folk still insisted on crowding me. I was forever pulling back my feet. I looked like a Cossack dancer, but without the colorful costume. Nothing would do those close-walkers but to brush past my legs and feet like a cat waiting for his bowl of Fancy Feast. They were closer than the bumpers of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Jeff Gordon drafting during the final lap of the Daytona 500. Closer than Russell Hantz to Survivor's Hidden Immunity Idols. Closer than Marlon Brando to Maria Schneider in Last Tango in Paris. Okay, not THAT close. But they could not stay away from Val.

No matter whether the walkers were pushing loved ones in wheelchairs, hauling oxygen tanks, or flying solo, they still came within millimeters of my withdrawn New Balance. One lady was pulling her teenage daughter by a clear length of oxygen tubing, yanking on it like she was a recalcitrant canine resisting the leash, saying, "Come ON." And still they trod treacherously close to Val's toes.

I wish I had thrust that shortbread rabbit/koala bear at them like a talisman. "Beware! BEWARE!" I think those close-walkers would have heeded my warning. Or else some old guy would have whacked me with his cane.

Next time I'm taking a shark cage for my own protection.