Office Visit

    "Don't sit by me, Don't sit by me, Please, don't sit by me,"   was the refrain running through my head in the waiting room.  The office was quite full, with patients for the 2 doctors seeing patients that day.  I was there for a follow-up visit, with some minor issues, but when I looked around at the other patients, I felt pretty darn healthy.  A little old man, bent over and appearing almost blind, said, when the nurse greeted him, that he was not doing well.  An extremely obese woman with a walker waited patiently, and across from her sat another woman with a walker/cart that could have held all her earthly belongings.  She was looking through a magazine, and by that I mean she was carefully separating each page, viewing it briefly, and then on to the next page, one by one.  A youngish woman in a wheelchair entered, accompanied by another woman, probably her mother.  The younger woman had only one leg.  A  man sat in the corner, wearing a wrist brace, but appearing otherwise normal.  The room was quiet. 
       The only conversation came from one man, middle-aged, who spoke continually the entire time, but not to anyone else.  He seemed to be speaking from a collection of past thoughts or impressions,  stream-of-consciousness it would be called in the literary world:   "snowballs, stones, bridging the boundaries; They don't tolerate no nonsense; lots of forms, 1971, The pleasure is all mine; Go East but Boston is West; I knew this was coming; I'm radioactive; anthrax; bubble about the moon rays; tar and feathers; murderer, burglar; Wynantskill psychopath."    He spoke fairly softly and no one seemed to notice.  When the nurse called him by name, he looked around:  "Who, me?  I thought you meant the other guy."  He entered into the chamber, never to be seen again.
    My silent plea that the seat next to me remain empty was triggered by the last patient to hobble into  the waiting room while I was still there.  He wore a polo shirt and khaki shorts, and the largest and most prominent catheter bag ever to make a public appearance.  Everything was outside his clothing, including the tubing and the collection bag, about half filled with freely flowing urine.  He really didn't look well at all, and I felt sorry for him and the other patients as well.  I also felt a little sick, and wanted to be home.
    I noticed that the other doctor visited the water cooler twice while I was there.  I thought at first that he might be getting water for a patient, but he drank it all himself.  This must be  tough job.