I’m home a little early today because I had an appointment with my psychiatrist. Yes, I am on the anti-depressants, and this is a very good thing.
While waiting for my doctor to admit me into his inner sanctum for my brief appointment, I had the pleasure of discovering an individual who will be among the first to stand with his back against the wall when the revolution comes. Or he should be, if there’s any justice in this world.
Allow me to explain. When I got to the office, located in a generic office park where each building has a cutesy central Texas name (bluebonnet, colorado, wildflower … you get the idea), there were three other people in the waiting room. There was a large woman who seemed to be looking for something in her purse (and never found it, as far as I could tell), a typical disaffected teenaged boy (black clothes, long hair, iPod), and a middle aged man wearing a gray polo shirt who had two cell phones in his hands.
I signed in, forked over the astronomical co-pay that is the result of the university’s crap insurance policy, sat down and started thumbing through the magazines (I usually try to bring a book, but I left the office in a hurry and forgot). Let’s see: Shape … no … Entertainment Weekly … it’s out of date and I get it at home anyway … Working Woman … oh, hell, no … Ooh. Architectural Digest. We have a winner! (If you didn’t know I’m a homo, you do now.)
Large woman is called into the inner sanctum. I start reading about the father’s transformation of his son’s loft on the lower West Side with a view of the Hudson (in Architectural Digest, everything happens in New York). Of particular note is my disgust at the part where it details how the father bought two chairs from an auction of Maria Callas’ property and had them re-upholstered. Blasphemy!
One of Gray Polo Shirt’s two cell phones rings. He answers it. It’s either his wife or his secretary. He’s sitting about five feet away from me and I can hear every word in the conversation because he has the volume up so loudly. I focus on the pictures in the article about the loft and wonder if the building charges extra for the chimney in the view. It occurs to me also to wonder whether the son is gay — he’s a jewelry designer, but I don’t honestly know whether that means anything.
I hear Gray Polo Shirt speaking loudly. In a distracted voice, he says, “Yes …. no … Don’t tell me that now, I’m going to forget.” I hear a long pause on the other end, and then hear the woman he’s speaking with ask, “You’ll forget ‘blue’?”
“Yeah,” he snaps, “I’m in the doctor’s office. I can’t write anything down.” For the life of me, I can’t see why. He’s been sitting there, holding one cell phone in each hand, and staring off into space since I arrived. He ends the call. I continue reading about the New York loft, finish the article, and move on.
The door into the inner sanctum opens. I can’t see which doctor it is, but I can tell from his voice that it’s not mine. iPod kid gets up. Gray Polo Shirt leaps out of his chair and crosses the room. “Do I need to come in there, too?” he demands. I’m so astonished that I forgot to follow this out of the corner of my eye while pretending to be fascinated with the renovation of a pool in Palm Springs and stare openly at what’s going on. What is going on?
The doctor asks the kid, “You want him in here?” iPod Kid answers no. Gray Polo Shirt sits down in the seat iPod Kid had occupied earlier. I stare at an ad for a faucet that costs more than my house.
My brain slowly puts it together. Grey polo shirt is iPod kid’s dad. They were sitting across the room from each other, not interacting at all. It’s starting to dawn on me why the kid is in therapy.
I move on to another article, this one about the lobby of the new Park Hyatt in Washington. Mostly, I read it because it’s not about New York, but I can’t remember where the Hyatt in Georgetown is. As I try to visually place the intersection of 24th and M Streets, Gray Polo Shirt picks up his phone again.
I am horrified to hear the following conversation take place:
Gray Polo Shirt (GPS): “Um, hi. I need some help changing the outgoing message on my voice mail.”
Woman on the other end: “OK, sir, can I have your phone number?”
GPS: [I actually remember it, but I'm not that mean.]
Woman: “OK, and your name?”
GPS: [I remember this too, but it's not important to the storyline].
Woman: “And your password?”
GPS: [Extremely loud sigh.] “Do you really need that?”
Woman: [muffled]
GPS: [Sighs even louder, shifts the phone to his other ear, makes eye contact with me and rolls his eyes.] “Can’t you just pull up the information on my phone?”
Woman: [I can't hear her, but she must be telling him that she needs to log in to his account to see what kind of phone he has.]
GPS: “I can tell you what kind of phone I have, it’s right here in my hand… No, I’m not calling you from it. [shifts, sighs louder than before.] Fine. It’s [still not that mean.]
Woman: “OK, now, you’ll need to dial star-8-6 and–”
GPS: “I need to dial what?”
Woman: [pauses] “star-8-6–”
GPS: “Star … and then what?”
Woman: “8-6.”
GPS: “Star-8-6. Hang on, let me try it.” [He puts the phone he's talking on down, picks up the other one and dials *86 while reading the numbers aloud. He does this twice, then picks up the other phone again.] OK, I got it.”
Woman: “OK, then what you’ll do is — ”
GPS: “Yeah, I can figure it out from here. Thanks.” [hangs up on her]
I look at my watch, hoping to God the doctor comes soon. In fact, he does. I go in to my appointment, thankful to be away from Gray Polo Shirt, because the combination of stupidity and arrogance is something that never sits well with me, and he’s exuding copious amounts of both.
When I leave, Gray Polo Shirt is leaving an outgoing voice mail on his cell phone. Since I’ve been away from the waiting room for about 10 minutes, I’m assuming that this means that he’s either had to call back for technical assistance again, or he’s re-recorded the same message several times. As I leave the waiting room, I make sure to close the main door just a little too loudly thinking that maybe, just maybe, he’ll have to record it again.
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