All in a Strange Day's Work

Today I visited Montcrief Rehab Center to visit elderly Marybelle Ashton. Marybelle is a friend of a church member whom I visited on request because of her knee injury. She fell in the bathroom. I had not met Marybelle before. It did not matter. Marybelle liked to talk no matter who the audience was. She had gray hair and wore large circular silver-framed glasses that only slightly magnified her beady black eyes. Those eyes stared at me nonstop while her verbal express train rushed down the tracks.

The minute I walked in the door Marybelle launched in. "I came here because of Dr. Hankenflank who works here. Now Dr. Hankenflank hasn't been to see me, not once, even though he's the resident physician. I don't understand it. I was at Memorial Hospital before I came to the rehab center after I fractured this knee. They were short of beds I guess. They put me in a room that looked like a broom closet. I think it was a broom closet. At least they took the brooms out. Anyway it rained all night the first night I was there and there was water pouring from the roof onto my bed. And there was an electric light up there. Electric light and water in a broom closet. Oh, my land! That water all over me and that light hanging down and I couldn't get a nurse's attention to save my life. Hold on, that TV is too loud. I'll turn it out. I mean I'll turn it down. Because I can't hear myself talking. I need to hear every word. So I can keep track of what I've said so far. Now, they brought me this burger with fries for supper. I'm supposed to be on low sodium. But this burger has sodium in it. So do the fries. I wonder what Dr. Hankenflank would say if he saw this? But he hasn't been here to see me, not once. I can't understand it. I thought he'd want to see me every day. Anyway, when I get my hospital bill from Memorial I'm telling them I won't pay for a private room, not after they put me in a broom closet. That's for janitors, not patients. Come to think of it they may not have taken all the brooms out. I'm sure I saw a straw broom in the corner.

"Oh, don't get up and leave yet. I have a scrapbook here. It has a hundred pages in it. I'll show you the whole thing. It's full of stories and pictures about me. My daughter brought it to me yesterday. It starts with me as a baby and goes all the way up to my ninety-third birthday last month. Now, here on Page One..."

I bowed out at this point leaving her with her scrapbook and sodium-laden burger and fries. Later I talked with a church member who shall remain nameless. This woman is slightly acquainted with Marybelle. She mused, "I'll only say what I once overheard from my family. My son Eric once asked his brother David whether Marybelle was autistic. David told him, "I don't think Marybelle's autistic. I think she's Nucking Futs."