Kaiser Walking

“Can you come in tomorrow?” 

The woman’s voice on the phone line was weary. I glanced at my calendar; tomorrow was free.

“Sure, that could work.”

“What time?”

“Oh….” I shifted my injured leg. It didn’t hurt sitting here, but I knew the walk around Kaiser would be impossible tomorrow. “Actually, can we make it in a week or so? I can’t walk right now.”

I couldn’t hear her sigh, but could feel it over the line. “How about June 9^th? 11:30?”

“That’d be great. Thank you. I didn’t even know you all were making appointments now.”

“Yes, well, radiology was the last up and running.”

“I could see why,” I said, thinking how a mammogram must be one of the most intimate procedures done routinely.

“Do you want a text or email reminder?” she asked, so ready to get off the line. She probably had tons of people to call yet.

“Text is great. Thank you. I should be able to walk better by then.”

And a week later,  I could. As I tromped down the stairs from the 3^rd floor of the Kaiser Parking lot, I barely thought about my leg. The pain was mostly gone. Yet, any distance tired it.

There wouldn’t be much distance walking at Kaiser today, mostly standing, as I wandered into the main hospital lobby. Confronted by a masked security guard who instructed me to sanitize my hands and asked if I had a cough, fever, etc., I felt a mixture of anxiety and confusion. Not unusual for a trip to Kaiser, but the coronavirus did exacerbate the entire experience.

            Walking down the hall toward radiology, I paused, momentarily confused, stymied by signage. Was a mammogram an "Intervention Radiology"? Or something different? It seems like an intervention, right? To prevent cancer. So, I turned and headed down the too-bright hall. It didn’t seem right. No one was around. Until a portly nurse dressed in blue took pity on me, “You lost, baby?”

            “Uh, yeah. I think so. Where’s mammograms?”

            “Back the other way. Come on I’ll show you.”

            I followed her, six feet distant,  the way I’d come, turned the corner and there it was, clearly labeled, “Radiology/Mammography.”

            “I almost was there,” I joked.

            Chuckling she opened the door with a cloth, “Yes you were! Have a nice day!”

Well, I thought, as I entered the room where a half a dozen patients, socially distanced and masked, were waiting, at least I got some more steps in!

            I’ll skip the check-in. Though having to shout my Kaiser Medical record number and birthdate from 6 feet away at the receptionist felt like a wrong protocol for privacy.

            In the Mammogram waiting room now, I waited, till another portly nurse waddled out, calling my name. “I’m LaTanya,” she introduced herself, leading me into the closed little room.

            “Hi,” I followed, still trying for the 6 ft social distancing. After all there had been signs all over the hospital up till this point. I was conditioned.

            “I like your ladybug mask,” she said, “cute.”

            “Thanks, a friend made it for me. She had lots of fabric scraps.”

            “Well, isn’t that nice. Now, we won’t be social distancing here. We will be 2 inches apart. No way ‘round this. I put on this protective equipiment. Oh, damn! It is so much!” She struggled to get the large plastic barrier attached. “I get so hot! First the mask. Then all this on top!. I tell you, Miss Carol, it is a trial. Go ahead and take a gown now, take off your clothes from the waist up. ”

            I do, and LaTanya positions me around the machine. Touching me obviously. The social distance that is so heavily practiced in the hospital is thrown out the window for mammograms. I wonder what the point is of all the protocols if they’re just gonna be 2 inches away from us during the procedures we’ve come in for?

            “Okay, baby, hold your breath! Don’t breathe don’t breathe don’t breathe!” I don’t, and simultaneously can’t help thinking of George Floyd yelling this to the officer kneeling on his neck and all the signs of the protestors with his cries for help: “I can’t breathe….”

            It’s a strange association with my breast squeezed between two radioactive slabs.

            “I know we have to wear all this here gear,” LaTanya continues as she comes back over to reposition my other side. “But what about us? Do you think we really are protected? Oh, no, we not! But they don’t care. All They care about is making money. They don’t care about us!”

            I nod, sympathetic, “Yeah,” I agree. I have always thought Kaiser was a non-profit, but then again, all these non-profits seem to be all about the bottom line. And their lack of care for their employees doesn’t surprise me one bit. Here it is again. The virus impacting ‘essential workers’, like LaTanya, who need the job, can’t say ‘no’ even though they are putting their health at risk.

            “I know people are hurtin’,” she continues. “Believe me, I know. But They don’t care about us. DON’T BREATHE DON’T BREATHE DON’T BREATHE” she hollers at me again from behind her protective booth.

            I don’t. Holding my breath, I wonder if I have breast cancer. Probably not. But I can’t help but wonder whenever I have a mammogram. Yet, I can’t process this right now. Social distancing. Non-profits exploiting their workers. LaTanya’s anger. She’s back close to me again, touching, repositioning. “Okay, baby, last one.” She repeats the process, telling me about how her wallet was stolen from right here at Kaiser. “Can you believe that? I don’t never have no money on me. Just plastic. But my wallet had my Kaiser ID in it and the name of my lawyer. Kaiser wouldn’t give out my information but they called my lawyer, the people who found the wallet did, and he contacted me and I got it back. I heard this story of how a little old lady, her purse was snatched at Walgreens. At Walgreens!” She clucks her tongue. “A little old lady! Can you imagine?”

            I start to dress, pulling on my top quickly, “Yeah, well, it’s tough being a little old lady.”

            “You got that right, Baby. We all finished here.”

            I start to head out, “Wait a minute, lemme wipe that handle for you.” I wonder why bother but she follows me out into the waiting room, “Which chair you sittin in, baby?”

            I glance around the empty room. I honestly can’t remember and tell her so. “I think it was here, but it might have been here….”

            “No worries. I got them both.” She grunts as she wipes. I step out into the hall. Exhausted and disoriented. I can’t go out the way I came in. I’m instructed to go around the temperature taking booth (which they didn’t do for me---again, the protocols—half assed? Or useless?) I walk around. More steps and think about LaTanya. How angry she was. How hellish her work situation is. Will she be safe here? Is anyone at Kaiser?

            I hope that all that wiping down keeps her safe. Esp. at 2 inches of no social distancing and an employer who doesn’t give a shit about its health care workers.

            I finally step out into the bright sunshine. A weirdo, masked in a red bandana, hails me with some off color remark. I hurry toward the parking garage. Stepping stepping stepping away from him, I dodge a lanky elderly woman, masked in blue, pushing herself along the sidewalk with her walker. A seagull swoops over me; I step out into the crosswalk. Pull my ladybug mask off. And breathe a sigh of relief....