in the presence of the king

I arrive fifteen minutes early for my noon appointment.  I am given a stack of papers on which I answer about thirty personal questions of a somewhat sensitive nature regarding my reproduction system and personal habits.
Then wait for thirty minutes.
I am here to see an OB/GYN they call "The King."

He is called "The King" because his patients always get pregnant.  There is nothing dubious, here.  It's just an appointment or two with The King, and parents-to-be from all over the tri-borough area are celebrating.  Legend has it that, after years of trying unsuccessfully, one woman...
found herself pregnant after The King offered her a mere handshake.  The lady that told me about The King --despite her great appreciation for him and the delivery of her two healthy children-- refrains from hugging him these days for fear of a third, unplanned pregnancy.

In the waiting area, I crochet.  ("I'm working on an afghan for a friend.")
Getting hungry, but I heed the "No Food In Waiting Area" signs.
Lady with a baby in stroller in front of me.
Pregnant twenty-something to my right.  She's loudly crunching into an apple.  I assume she hasn't let the sign, and well, she's pregnant, so I, of course, forgive her.
I'm called back to answer twelve of the thirty personal/sensitive questions I just answered on paper to a nurse tech who is thirteen years old.  She is from the Bronx.  She is skilled in her duties, not in customer service.  Smiling is evidently not part of her job description.
Back to the waiting room.
A young pregnant woman in traditional Orthodox Jewish dress code is now to my right.
There is a thirty-something pregnant lady next to her.
An upper east-side blond and her gorgeous friend enter and sit to my left.  Neither of them appears pregnant, but I learn that it's the blond, because her friend compliments her on her top, to which she replies, "this maternity top?"
The Orthodox Jewish woman eats a snack out of a noisy wrapper.
My eyes dart to the "No Food" sign, but she's pregnant, so I forgive her.
I complete a square of the afghan I am making ("No, not a baby blanket.  Just a blanket.")
The thirty-something lady eats a yogurt.  (Does pregnancy affect eyesight?  The signs are right there!  Two of them!)  But she's pregnant, so I forgive her.
My stomach growls.

A well-dressed nurse calls me back and I answer sixty-seven questions, thirty of which I have answered on paper, and twelve of which went through one ear of the thirteen year-old nurse tech --and promptly out her other-- just twenty minutes prior.

During questioning, the attractive nurse before me smiles at my daily exercise and frowns at my daily wine.  She makes excellent and frequent eye contact and says things like, "you did the right thing by coming here!" and "I'm going to take care of you!"
She sends me back to the waiting room.

I crochet another square.  ("No, not a baby blanket.  Just a blanket.")
The girl in the cute top has ordered a pizza, which she shares with her friend.  I'd forgive her, but she looks too pretty and thin to be pregnant or eating pizza.
The Ultra Sound nurse comes for me, notices my blanket and says, "Oh how cute!  Is it- ?
"It's a table cloth."
She asks me about five of the most popular questions of the day and tells me to take off "everything from the waist down."  (Why can't we have our socks?  It's the feet that get coldest, and there's not much fertility information in my toes.)
We have a short exchange regarding the question of whether or not my insurance company will cover an ultra sound.
She doesn't have a clue.

HER:  Should I check with the front desk?
ME:  Yes.

I take off my clothes.  Including my socks.
She returns.  Guess what?
They don't have a clue.
But they're calling my insurance company.
She'll be right back.
In her absence, my toes turn blue.
She comes back.

HER:  We got a hold of them.  They don't have a clue.
ME:  Great.
HER:  Still want the Ultra sound?

Well, I here now, naked, blue, hungry, with a half-completed blanket and an empty womb...!

ME:  Yes, the ultra sound, please.

In the exchange that follows, she repeatedly instructs me to keep my thighs parted, which I obediently do.  Every time, my knees drop outward, and every time my little Catholic adductor muscles then contract and draw them back to close parallel contact.  The conversation goes like this:

HER:  Let your knees fall open.
ME:  (friendly, but nervous)  I've never had an ultra sound.
HER:  Really?  They're not too bad.  They're more fun when you're pregnant.

No shit?  You mean gals don't drop by just for a peek at the old uterine wall on their way out between shopping and cosmos?

HER:  Tell me if you feel any discomfort.  And, can you let your knees fall open?

Now, I'd only seen what they show on TV:  a little jelly on the belly, roll the wand, and duh-nuh-nuh-na-na!  Let's go to the movies...!  So with naivety from head to freezing toe, I say:

ME:   Are ultra sounds uncomfortable?
HER:  Not the external... (She holds up an instrument roughly the size of my Cuisinart immersion blender.)  I need to you to let your knees fall open.

One of my toes falls off.

ME:  That's going inside me?
HER:  Just this much...

I let my knees fall open and in the nanosecond before my inner thigh muscles can reverse the movement... we're in!  I'm watching a poor-quality black and white film of my ovaries.  (The acting is fine, but the cinematography is lame!)  I learn a few things about my pipery and then the Cuisinart comes out.  I can collect my toes and get dressed; The King can see me in a few minutes.

I head out to the waiting room to make a second blanket, two pillow covers, and a small purse.  A pregnant brunette is speaking on her phone in French while working on her laptop and balancing a plate of Chicken Coq au Vin on one knee.  A delivery guy arrives and hands several bags of food through the glass-paned window at reception.  The staff has to clear a festive sheet cake out of the way to make room for their lunches.

I have shrunk a dress size in the time I have been here and I miss my tenth toe.

I am summoned to meet The King.  I wait in one of his leather chairs and gaze at the snapshots of moms, babies, twins, and families that The King has helped into reality.  There are letters of gratitude covering every inch and surface of this room, most of them hand-written.  I am overwhelmed by the beauty of this man's role in the world and by the miracle that is life.
When the doctor enters, I knock over a few items of furniture in my haste to shake his hand.
There.
We did it.
I'm probably pregnant now, so I'm ready to go home.
But, rather, we sit and he asks me a few questions, all of which I have answered three times already, in the last two hours, within these very walls.
After questioning, he tells me that my husband and I should each have some lab work done (outside of this office in a couple of weeks) and that I should give some blood before I leave.  With the results of all three tests, we'll have enough information on how to proceed.
Great!  Whatever you say!  I touched your hand, so...  my blood?  Sure!  How much?
Well, it turns out...

a fucking lot.

Perhaps the thirteen year-old nurse tech is a vampire who has taken this job as the perfect cover.   Included in her deal with the devil is eternal youth.  She's actually 460 years old.

460 YEAR-OLD VAMPIRE WHO LOOKS 13:  You wanna have some wadduh and siddown?   'Cause 'ats a lotta tubes.
ME:  (sipping water)  Yeah, I should warn you, I get a little faint when I give blood.
460 YEAR-OLD VAMPIRE WHO LOOKS 13:  Yeah, that's why I said you should have some wadduh and siddown 'cause it's a lotta tubes.

"Tubes" is not translating.
Like "fallopian?"  There are only two; I just saw them in a black and white movie with no plot.
She holds up a dozen empty vials, which, I quickly comprehend, my life-fluid is about to occupy.
I turn a little a pale and feel a phantom twitch where my tenth toe used to be.
She does not notice.  She takes the final bite of her General Tso's Chicken and inserts a needle into my left arm.  I'm not looking, but I hear her say-
--out loud--
--audibly--
--to me, presumably--
"Tsk; I can't find this vein."
I think I have been rather composed today.  I think I have been polite.  I have been pretty strong.  But, at this point, I have been at this office for two hours, eaten nothing for the last five hours, answered a slew of personal/sensitive questions, viewed my insides, and lost a toe.  Also, I am the only not-pregnant person here.  So, when the thirteen year-old stabs and misses my vein, I:

a.)  no longer believe she is a 460 year-old vampire.
b.)  cry

A new nurse with considerably more compassion and, it turns out, aim comes over, sees my tear-streaked / sea foam-colored face, and soothes me with a friendly voice while simultaneously stabbing a needle into my right arm.  Before I know it, they are draining me of pints of blood.  I know this, because when I turn my head away from the arm being pricked, my gaze falls on the tray of vials.  I'm pretty cool until vial #28 when, seated, I start to wobble.  "Almost done," I hear her say, but the words are coming from two blocks down Park Avenue.
The needle now out, I thrust my head low and finally, willingly, let my knees fall open.
It is not long before I collect myself and am released.  I thank everyone there as if we have all collaborated on some award-winning project, and as I exit, you know what they tell me?  I shit you not:

"Be sure to have something to eat."

Epilogue

Later I explain to my husband the events of my visit to The King.  I explain that after all that, we each have an additional test to schedule.  While we both know what it will entail, my husband is not enthusiastic about his upcoming Semen Analysis, and he becomes very quiet.  Neither of us knows what my procedure will entail, so I look up "hysterosalpingogram."  With this new knowledge, I become very quiet.  No one is saying much inside our little dwelling in Queens.  The TV is on mute.  The questions of pregnancy, babies, and the life-altering effects they would bring, move like ghosts from one small room to another in our barely-afforded 3rd story apartment.  We ponder the costs versus the benefits of what we are about to undertake.  How far are we willing to press?  How many more tests?  How much more money?  How many months are we willing to try?  A cost.  A gamble.  And no guarantee that in the end there will be a baby.

As I prepare dinner, I am thinking about the hysteroslpingogram I have to undergo.   From the couch, my husband voices some... trepidation about his own upcoming "appointment."  I am not sure what to say; I'd like to reassure him, but I too, am feeling uneasy.  And then, from the silence, words come to me, like they do, mysteriously, to those in need: those bereft, or frightened, or unsure.  As if whispered from a Higher Power, an Angel of Strength, Mother Nature Herself:

"I have been naked and questioned and prodded today.  Next week, I'll again be asked to disrobe, spread my legs, and withstand some discomfort whilst they stick a tube up my twat whereby a "radio-opaque material" will be squirted into my cervical canal in order to create clearer images for the X-ray of my nether regions.  Prior to this exam, it is encouraged that I take a laxative, wear comfortable clothes, and arrange for a ride to and from the test.  I can expect some cramping and discomfort during the procedure, and bleeding over the few days that follow.  Dear husband, forgive me when I fail to muster more sympathy for the fact that at the same time of my seven-syllable procedure, you'll be asked to jerk off in a cup." 

The Queens Kickshaw is one of Astoria's gems.  Not only do they have a terrific interior and coffee, they make the transition from coffee shop to tavern beautifully.  The food is really good and there is often live music.  I don't think I can say enough good stuff about this spot.  I think it's my current favorite.
 40-17 Broadway, Astoria NY 11103  718.777.0913  http://thequeenskickshaw.com/  

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