Yesterday I went to the doctor's for a check-up. It was my first time with the family doctor that Jonah sees. Though the building is quite generic and the architecture impersonal, the waiting room looks far into the distance across the city. And on a sunny day during a dark rainy winter just seeing the blue sky brings relief that there is a world beyond the grey bubble one has been inhabiting.
In the waiting room I skimmed The New Yorker, a magazine that usually leaves me cold, but that once in a while offers an entertaining and insightful bit of prose. The poetry usually seems too forced and more of an intellectual game rather than a small meditation or still life - the type of poetry I enjoy. Yesterday for the first time, I found a gentle and evocative poem in The New Yorker. It reminded me of my sister's song lyrics. It was about the memories of a woman who used to live on an island. The magazine also had a non-fiction piece about a couple taking a trip to an old New England cemetery and visiting the graves of their relatives who lived in the 1700's. It made me think of similar trips I've made, though I've never seen the graves of those beyond my great-grandmother's generation.
The other day Tim stated the obvious - that Jonah is the first generation in my family born in the U.S. He's right, I thought, as his words sank in this time, suddenly realizing the significance of this in the scheme of my family history beyond the tiny bubble in which I normally live. The feeling that accompanied that realization was an intriguing coupling of excitement and gravity. I am grateful that my family immigrated to this country. One of the biggest gifts life here has given me is open-mindedness and a broader view of the world and the people in it. But what many immigrants feel here, and I am among them, is a sense of impermanence, isolation, and a vastness without depth. I don't know if this makes sense to those born and raised here. There is also the unshakable sensation of being uprooted when one leaves the only culture he knows to live in another. But though I still feel all this, I also know that this place is my home now and that it's Jonah's home as well. As an immigrant, however, I will always probably feel split - a big part of me here and another part of me elsewhere. This can be confusing, but useful as well. It enables me to be more empathetic towards those who navigate between cultures, languages, races, etc. And that's why I gravitate to the work that I do.
But I digress. This entry was about me going to the doctor's, wasn't it?
When the nurse called me in, I wasn't quite done with the cemetery article. She seemed like a smoker - slightly gruff with a raspy voice and deep lines on her face. She wore cheerful scrubs, the kind that is supposed to make children less afraid of the doctor. The top had the word hello written on it in dozens of languages in bright colors and juvenile fonts. Well hello, nurse! Happy to see you today, I thought.
She weighed and measured me. Since I don't own a scale, my weight is always a surprise to me. This time I was dismayed to find that I am the heaviest I've ever been (excluding the pregnancy). It is time to bust that fat! Where is that Richard Simmons when I need him? I was so distracted by the numbers on the scale that I stopped paying attention to the nurse's instructions. I didn't realize she wanted me to turn around to be measured and then to follow her into the examination room. I must have seemed a little slow, if you know what I mean. But what I was doing was scheming about how I need to start an exercise program. And I do have plans, so stay in tune.
The doctor was pleasant as always. I found out she was expecting her second baby who is due in June. Too bad my leisurely visits with the midwives aren't the norm. Where are the times when I was served tea and had my feet or shoulders rubbed for the last part of my appointment? It's hard to get used to the pace of conventional medicine. The most memorable part of my appointment nowadays seems to be the wait.
