Pass the Torch
A couple of weeks ago I was talking to my oldest brother, on the occasion of his 83rd birthday, and after the annual recitations of “Happy birthday, you old dog,” and his parry—after a welcome report that he’s in good shape and just won a tennis match against a friend 20 years his junior—of “I’m just glad we’re still around to talk on the phone.” That elicited for an automatic “Amen,” from my corner. He did express a new attitude about all the doctors he sees, saying he treats them as minor annoyances, like shaving each morning. One disquieting reality we agreed on: doctors we’ve known for years are all retiring or on the cusp of it. Breaking in a new physician takes work, a little schmooze and the acknowledgement that, say, a dentist who’s 35 is fully capable, even if he or she looks like a college student.
I often enjoy shooting the shit with a medical professional—especially once it’s ascertained that nothing dire is occurring, at least yet—and such was the case last week when I went for my annual dermatology check-up. My wife noticed an ominous mole on my back, but fortunately the lady I see said it was of no import. Then, she burned off several pre-cancerous spots (although very fair-skinned, I’ve escaped the curse of my mom and two of my brothers, who can count their fireball removals in the low-thousands) with an enormous torch and we traded jokes and complained about the complexities of modern life. She’s not much younger than me and shares the frustration of wrangling with a bank over the phone and wasting an hour after getting shuffled to six different people in six different countries. She asked if I still smoked (she quit years ago) and when I said yes, she merely cocked an eyebrow and that was that.
A lot of my procedures are at GBMC, a top-notch hospital in Baltimore County, and on Dec. 11th—after cracking up once more at the sign affixed to each entrance, “No weapons allowed,” which never, ever gets old because if someone’s carrying a mere sign won’t do any good—I saw that Christmas season was in full swing, with cardboard Santas peeking out from almost every corner, a modified nativity scene in the lobby (the hospital isn’t affiliated with any particular religion), and garland and strings of colored lights filling out the decorations.
At the dermatologist’s office, most of the support staff wore gaudy, but appropriate, Christmas tiaras. I complimented the woman who accepted my co-pay (almost no one pays with cash, she said, which still baffles me, remembering not long so ago when credit cards had a minimum), and she responded with a festive grin. Luckily, no Andy Williams carols played in the background—the always-palatable Nat King Cole instead—and I didn’t dare suggest that Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl’s “Fairytale of New York,” a Christmas classic the day it was released, be added to the mix. Fair enough, Kirsty singing “You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy faggot,” isn’t, even today, kosher. I told my wife about the holiday spirit, and she said it probably gave a jump in the step to the employees, and would be swell for any children. I noted that if any pre-teen was at a dermatologist’s warren, no amount of cheer, phony or real, would provide.
Also on Dec. 11th, The New Yorker’s scold—one of 25 at that slip-slidin’-away weekly—Susan Glasser was in no mood for seasonal mirth. A reasonable observer would think that shout-from-the-molehills pundits like Glasser would tire of their All Trump All the Time essays, and though I believe reason has hardly vanished from the United States, for TDS sufferers, the paycheck comes first, second and third. And if the opinions are rote, that’s an up-the-nose-with-a-rubber-hose raspberry to all skeptics.
The headline reads, “The Curse Of Trump 2.0” and focuses on the President’s vulgarity. As I wrote shortly after the 2024 election, it’d be no surprise if the Democrats clean up in next November’s midterms and win back the White House in 2028. That’s merely a presidential cycle: if the economy sucks, the incumbents suck. Fair enough.
But Glasser and her (mostly) East Coast colleagues are stuck on the fact that Trump’s gauche and makes silly off-hand remarks. (Granted, his post about Rob Reiner’s murder was ill-timed, even for him) She writes: “Although he’s always been lewd and rude, a liar and extemporizer whose public shows are designed to shock and entertain, his tongue has clearly been loosened by advancing age and the adoring bubble of sycophants in which he now exists… Trump now talks in public the way he does in private—swearing, rambling, sexist, racist.”
Again, what president isn’t a liar? I think you’d have to go back to Calvin Coolidge to find an exception.
—Follow Russ Smith on Twitter: @MUGGER2023