I had to engage the services of new physicians last week. There were all kinds of intrusive procedures and numerous questions to be answered in this medical misadventure.

”Are you allergic to any thing?

“Well, not that I’m aware of,” I lied.

Have you had a tetanus shot in the last five years?

“Well, I really couldn’t say, because I’ve only been fishing in the stream of time for the last 20 or so years and unfortunately neglected to keep an accurate chronological count,” I replied.

“Have there been any documented cases or episodes of suicide in your family past or recent?”

“Well, not unless you count the dog that got ran over last week. It might not count but I always thought of him as family.”

“And while he was pretty much a ‘road-smart hound,’ he managed to get mangled  by  a Mustang. Whether it was a deliberate act on his part, I couldn’t say.

“He didn’t seem to be depressed,” I added.

“Were you vaccinated against childhood  diseases, did you ever catch anything in the form of viruses?” he asked.

“Like I said: It was a long time ago and I wasn’t keeping records, but I remember getting bitten by a mad dog and having to take a ‘Baker’s Dozen’ of rabies shots.”

Then they switched doctors on me.
 
The new one had a whole different set of questions. The first words out of her mouth were, “You hated your mother didn’t you? Didn’t you?” she screamed.

I truthfully replied, “Why, of course not; I never met the woman. I was ‘farmed out’ to the Mississippi State Children’s  Home in 1955 , and released in to the custody of my adoptive parents. I never even met her.

“If she had a quirk that I may have taken umbrage to, I never got a chance to form an opinion one way or another.

“Knowing what I know now about kids in general and me in particular, I think the old gal had her head on straight when she pitched me out with the dishwater, because I ain’t been nothing but trouble since I escaped from that state institution at the ripe old age of 5 months and 4 days.”

So, I was thinking to my self, this is the nut doctor. The state thinks I’m a basket case.  I have been knowing that for years, so logically speaking that puts me one up on the board.

If I’m lucky, I just might be able to get a crazy check out of this, I was thinking, so that was the tack I took.

After having given considerable thought to what ever strategies lay at hand I decided to forego all my training and  expertise accumulated over a half century in the business of professional as well as creative lying.

I broke the cardinal rule, God being a witness, and told the truth.  And I didn’t leave out nothin.’

People, that confessional statement that could be verified and was a guaranteed pass key to the splendors attendant to a crazy  check with all the bells and whistles on it.

They took all my statements and recorded all the truth they could salvage from the testimony available from witnesses, who would tell a $40 lie for a nickel in advance under normal circumstances but for once they were telling the truth.

It’s a fact that no good deed shall go unpunished. I was informed by the board of mental health that, while I was indeed crazy,  I was overqualified for the benefits because I was crazier than the present government had a viable policy for.

As it stands, it appears that I ain’t crazy enough for outright commitment, but I’m too damn crazy for government work.

As I was leaving I overheard one of those quacks say to the other, ”Do you think there was anything we could have done to help that poor patient?”

“No,” the other quack replied. “He’s probably got enough residual herbs and spices in his system left over from the 60s and 70s to carry him through. If not he’ll figure out something. He seems to be a resilient sort of fellow.”

Still surviving,

Ricky Harpole

(Contact Harpole at www.facebook.com/harpolive or www.colespointrecords.com)