Alan Pitts: Enemy in the Mirror


An Afternoon at DaVita

By Alan Pitts, Community Activist, Artist, Disabled Individuals Advocate, Political Analysis 

             The people around me are always asking ‘how’s the dialysis going.’ A couple of weeks ago I didn’t even know how to spell dialysis. It’s Halloween and my mind is on my eldest son who was living just one block away from the Ocean on Bath Avenue in Long Branch, New Jersey. In our last conversation, I scolded him for not evacuating to Monmouth University where they had set up a makeshift shelter where students could safely ride out he storm. He told me that the police were saying that if you haven’t already left, stay put. I told him to stay put then, and don’t do anything stupid. I told him about when I rode out Hurricane Fredrick. I was about his same age. In fact, I lived just a few blocks away from where he is now.

            I still haven’t heard from him. My wife told me that she had talked with a young lady at his job who saw him several times since Sandy hit. She stated that she lives very close to him and had assured her that he was just fine. I was envisioning my  poor boy wondering aimlessly through the carnage like a zombie.  “Who am I, where am I, what am I doing here?” It’s Halloween. Okay?

            My 9 year old son said to me, “Dad you ought to dress up like Frankenstein since you got that thing in your neck and you got those dark circles around your eyes.” His big grin always makes me smile. I kind of felt like Frankenstein. The hair cut is not completely wrong. Still, I look to much like Denzel to be a monster. Not!. Even so, I do have two tubes attached to my heart poking out my neck, plugged at the end with one red plug and one blue plug. With all the drugs and having all the blood  in my body drained and pumped back in, makes me feel like I am living on borrowed time. Not  unlike Frankenstein, wondering what villager he pissed off this time.

            Sitting in the waiting room half full of the patents waiting for one of the white coat technician to call their name and then escort them to their chair. I really don’t know who’s who. Dr. Phil is on a large flat screen  TV mounted on the wall. There’s a bulletin board with the faces of the different patients. Most of them elderly, most of them black., most of them appearing to be of meager  means, most of them in wheel chairs, most of them unaware that they were being stalked by a silent killer that would leave them married to a machine. For some of them, coming to the clinic is a social event. A family affair, a family reunion. I am careful not to make any eye contact since I don’t know anyone there. These old dudes are known for cutting a fellow.

            “Whose bright idea was it to take a 200 year old ship out in a dang gone hurricane.” I could see out the corner of my eye a gray bearded gentlemen who chewed     between words as if his mouth was full French bread. I don’t think he was eating bread.

            “If I’m gonna drink white liquid er a’l just as soon drink corn.” Said the little butter nut brown, stomp of a woman who looked like she had spent a lot of time in her wheelchair. Like she and the wheelchair had become a single entity.

            “I like that Quervo Another woman stammered.

            “Yup, Qua-zo’s good too.” the little lady agreed.

            You can drink on this stuff? The thought crossed my mind. Then I told myself, I don’t even want to think about waking up with the taste of Chardonnay on my breath this soon. Not this early in the game. Who knows, dialysis might be the best cure for a hangover known to man.

            I thought I could sleep the whole 4 hours. Then I remember the training I received showing me how to manually crank my blood back into my body in the event the machine lost power. ‘And don’t forget to shake this filter to make sure it get all of your red blood cells back. You need your red blood cells.‘ Duh, so much for a pity party.

            To my surprise I did go to sleep. “Mr. Pitts, Mr. Pitts. . . dear, I’ m going to change your dressing. Her voice echoed into my conscience like honey. I opened my eyes to witness an angle. No, no angle, just a nurse. A very nice nurse, but I don’t think angle describes her well. Half of her face was covered by a mask revealing only a wrinkled brow and striking blue eyes. She wore a lot of make up, bright red cheeks, her pores distinct. She was small framed like my wife with sandy blond hair.  Eventual I got around to asking her if you could drink alcohol on dialysis, partially because she looked like she may had knocked back one or two in her days.

            She eventually got around to telling me you could, but like anything else, you have to do it in moderation.

            When I look in the mirror I see a guy who lacked moderation. “You did this to yourself, you know?” I admit to myself.

            I notice a man about my age, which happens to be about the average age of all the patients in this clinic. He was struggling with a very thin elderly woman in a well worn wheelchair. She grunted and hurled obscenities as he tried his best to accommodate the old woman. Perhaps a son caring for his mother. He was tying to put her jacket on but she was fighting him.

            Then as if casting a magic spell over the woman she went limp and allowed him to have his way, when he asked rather frankly. “You wanta go home, don’t you?”

            If you listen, you can hear the world. Who was this old woman and if any part of who she was, still remained? Was it even wrong dragging her down here every other day and hitching her to a machine for 4 hours. To save something that was already lost. Or, maybe she just didn’t like this guy. Who knows?

            While all up in those folks’ cool aid, [that’s slang for ‘business’] trouble was a brewing elsewhere. My technician was putting on her gloves, she looked down at me and said. “I can’t use these, I have to use my own special gloves cause my hands are so small.” I agreed that she did have small hands. “What happened to the rest of me, huh?”

            I assured her that that was not what I was thinking. As long as you can make a fist and handle your business.” I said after a brief pause.

            “I can handle my business.” She assured.

            Old Blue Eyes walked by and, and squeezed her shoulder in a consoling gesture. “She don’t know how we are around here. We all help each other.” She whispered in the technician’s  ear before dashing off.

            She looked down at me and said. “I’m sorry, I’m gonna tell you the truth. I ain’t gonna bite my tough, she didn’t have to say that to me.” she went on exhibiting some of the same swagger as when she represented that her  knuckle game was solid.

            I didn’t have a clue as to what she was going on about. Perhaps the raising of one eyebrow in response was enough to let her know that I feel for you, I agree with you, but I have my own problems trying to figure out if you helping me or killing me slowly. It was when she said that she hoped she didn’t loose her job, that she had my full attention.

            “Loose your job?” I repeated. The Community Activist coming out of me. “You shouldn’t loose your job, for speaking your mind.” Still not knowing what was going on. Or if I was right or wrong.

            “Oh yeah. . . You don’t know how they are around here”

            Then she went on to tell me about the little blow-up which had just taken place a few feet away, which I did not notice because my attention was focused on the dispute between the man and the old woman in the corner. Like almost every person in a chair, I had ear buds in.

            As it was, as usual, Old Blue Eyes was bouncing around the clinic, trying to do three things at one time. Nuckles and Blue Eyes converged upon each other in front of the chair being occupied by  an extremely dark skin elderly woman who by all indication, was in a terrible mood. The Blue Eyes began to apologize “I’m sorry Honey, I didn’t forget, the phone ringing and I’m running in circles. For heaven’s sake.”

            “Mr. Pitts’ caps are open and I got put in his Heparin. . .” Nuckles was saying in a conciliatory tone and took two syringes from the nurse which she had taken from her lab jacket pocket to hand to her.

            “You ain’t got to explain nothing to her, you’s about the only somebody around here doing what you suppose to be doing.” she blurted. According to Nuckles, offended  by the sight of a white woman apologizing to a lowly black woman trying to earn a living and support her family as a single parent. “Dumb ass negr6es . .” she grumbled under her breathe.

            Despite keeping me waiting, Nuckles could not resist the calling to testify, putting it mildly.  She told the old woman that we all work a lot around here. Everybody here got a job to do. I got to take care of my patients like she has to take care of her’s. Nobody around here is lazy. If you think somebody ain’t doing their job, you tell that doctor when he comes in here. Her soliloquy was cut short with the realization that I was sitting over there against the wall with a surgical mask on and two tubes coming out my shoulder with the ends uncapped.

            “I was just speaking my mind. . .” She continued as she unhooked me from the machine.

            “I feel you.” I offered. “It’s harder to be a door, than a door mat.”

            When I was finally finished and on my way out the door I looked over at the old dark skinned woman  Her skin was smooth as if kissed by the sun or burned until she  was as black as charcoal. A stocking cap stretched over her thick mop like Afro. In contrast, the metallic rims of her circular bifocals, reflected the bright white lighting that bathe the room. She looked as if she could had been from centuries past. As if she could had been born on a plantation.  I nodded as if to greet her. She snarled like a cornered raccoon, poked her mouth out, and turned away.

            I wondered who was this woman and were had she been? Why did she give such deference to white people? Or even if her diatribe was even based upon race. Had she been the house keeper for a wealthy white family? Was she taught from a very early age to fear white people? Or respect them with a fear in her heart over the fact that your well being and survival depended on them, and their every whim, whatever they may be. Did she hate her own people? She sure looked like she hated me. I can’t say I don’t get  that black people often resent other people of their same race. But that’s not something unique to black people. Or “Blah People”, according to that ex-Senator, Rick Sanatorium. But it really goes to the degree of the resentment and the causation. It’s human nature to resent success. If you don’t believe me, ask Mitt Romney. Or ask that 16 year old wannabe home coming queen who could make the cheer leading squad.

          I thought for a moment about my own feelings for white people. I don’t think I was ever afraid  of white people for the sole reason of the fact that they were white people, not even when I was very young. Although I knew many of my peers who were.  Although I was born in the area and most of my family members were also born here and still live here, for the most part I grew up in the North East. I had white friends, Joe Bubblin and Joseph Samboni and Raymond England and Mark Hardwood. I knew quite a few white people from the Kingdom Hall. My mother had many white friend and church friends. I’ll admit that I was somewhat envious of their ranch and split level, middle class homes; As opposed to our not so nice 100 year old, four story wood framed dump in the heart of town. Envy and respect, but not fear. On my way out I was careful not to pass by the old woman or make eye contact. I  could feel her eyes following me. I wondered when this old woman saw her black face in the mirror, with tattered pink lips and yellow eye , did she see a friend or the enemy within.

Update: Nuckles came up to me and cheerfully announced that the old woman had come to her an apologized. She said  “. . .that  y’all know being on this machine ah work your last nerve. . .She gave me a big hug, with her sweet self.” She said with a big smile. DaVita, I am coming to know is like a family. Like most families, it suffers from some  dysfunction. But at the end of the day, the family survives. Life is like a family and the family will al-ways survive.