TIME TRAVELING TO THWART "THE MAN"

And His Lazy Demons

It’s one-thirty in the morning when my alarm goes off. I’m upright by virtue of simply being a little dried out as a human; I’m standing up like a naked toilet paper tube. I go through the motions of packing. I have no anxiety around it as I usually do simply because I have just given in to this state; “I will forget something incredibly important.” I have no extra brain power to problem solve. The chips will fall where they may. I’m on my (long) way to Burlington to catch a six am flight to Portland. I will be mixing my new record out there and I can’t wait for a shower and a change of scenery. I fall asleep the second I’m in my seat on my first flight to Chicago for my connection. The bright side of this earliness is that I arrive in Portland just before noon, pick up my rental car and meet my dear friend, Tucker Martine for our first studio coffee catch-up of the session. It’s so good to be back here, and despite being crazy-tired I am enjoying the fact that this qualifies as a superb day, which means so much after the hard week of loss. I’d like to say I was cool through it all, but I wasn’t. 

The day before I left I had the usual laundry list of stuff to do before I leave on a long trip. One of the items was “Call Dr. Jen.” I have been trying to get a referral to a dermatologist for three months. This was not Dr. Jen’s fault mind you, it’s a long story involving a doctor who just bugged out “byeeeeeeee” for greener pastures. (Healthcare in Vermont is virtually nonexistent) Her last-second farewell, “all your appointments are cancelled!” email sang like a compassionless fart. Normally, I may not have cared and said “good riddance,” but I have a spot under my eye I saw her for that is concerning as it is changing and growing. She didn’t bother to send a dermatologist referral despite the fact that I paid for the appointment. So as you’d guess, my lust for life keeps me hollering for help. Another long story involves failed attempts to see my GP, Dr. Jen due to my being out of town. We settled on the telehealth idea which was perfect, but a bad link put an end to that. The front desk person was very helpful and got a message from the doc that I could email a picture of the offending spot to get the referral started. Great! Can-do! But two weeks later having heard nothing I called the clinic. There must have been some accidental disconnect. The long and the short is, I explained the situation to the front desk person who listened to nothing I had to say, then accused me of cancelling the appointment? I was dumbstruck. WTF? After a bit more non-helpful crap from the woman I interrupted with “look man! I’m SCARED! I need a referral to see a dermatologist! My voice was raised, though far from a yell. The person accused me of “going off.” So then I actually went off. “Can you just ask the doctor if she’s seen the email containing the photo of my eye and is she giving me a referral!? This spot is growing and flaking and other weird shit and I don’t want fucking cancer!” I was then scolded for swearing. This woman who had the job of facilitating and connecting possibly LIFE SAVING healthcare was gatekeeping. I was over her. I asked for the office manger. She just put me on hold for an ungodly amount of time, so I hung up, called back and asked again. She told me he was out of the office. Clearly my doctor was NEVER going to hear from me. I decided to go throught the patient portal to leave an email message for the doctor. Strangely, my message to Dr. Jen was answered by the absent office manager. How is it that a message for the doctor was read by him? I was creeped out. Did my doctor ditch me for saying “I don’t want fucking cancer?”Anyway, he said after looking through my files (I never spoke to him, let alone give him leave to do that) that he could ask for a referral (not that I’ve seen one yet) and also in the future I needed to “refrain from raising my voice at office staff. We are here to help you, not hurt you.” What am I? Five years old? My actual doctor would never stand for this shit. I’ve been seeing her for almost 20 years and we have a really solid relationship. What is a person to do when people work at keeping you from your doctor? And WHY THE FUCK would someone elect to do that?? I put my computer down and started bawling. I was shocked and surprised by this. Dipshit bureaucrats don’t make me cry! What’s going on here!? Then I remembered picking up my mail and opening a card from the vet who put Jerome to sleep. I did not expect to see his pawprint on the card. I froze the feeling with all my strength. But I guess I didn’t freeze it solid enough, because here I was crying my eyes out on the front porch in reaction to some gatekeeper dickheads. I saw Jerome’s speckled paw in front of me. I remembered a zoom meeting I was supposed to be on in five minutes and cancelled it. I miss you, sweetheart.

The rest of the day was self-concious, low energy and tinged with sadness and defeat. But, the recording did get finished and I made my flight at the crack. Now I’m here in Portland and feeling relieved to be out of my normal time zone. I am thinking about gatekeepers and their sometimes lazy and disgusting motivations or non-motivations. I think about how companies have also made robots gatekeepers, and seldom even have a phone number you can call. How have you been hindered by gatekeepers? And does anyone out there have any good gatekeeper hacks? Especially in regards to healthcare. Thanks, and I hope you are well and blissfully gatekeeper-less. XO

My new friend, Mr. Bun-Bun who lives in the bushes of my air BB. I hang out with them daily.