ADVENTURES IN MEDICINE

My assessment of the situation suggested that smoking was not allowed anywhere near the entrance but the rule was not being enforced. I decided the arrangement worked for me and lit up. It was likely that the worst that could happen was being told to put out the cigarette, if anything at all. It felt like being a rebel of sorts, a piece of product the machine had not yet shaped to fit their specifications.

Within minutes the bench was free and I sat down. A face I recognized but whose name I could not remember sat down beside me. He had been a regular at the coffee house. As we began to chat he gave me directions to the Timmies inside the hospital and warned me of the steep prices on some of the foods. I thanked him for the information and he left soon after.

The familiar man in the wheelchair with the Listerine aroma was pushed up the sidewalk beside me next to the bench by a good Samaritan. In his gravelly voice, he began to tell me how the police had broken up a gathering he had been at and one officer had punched him on the jaw. He made no mention of what he had said or done to get that reaction from the policeman but I assumed it wasn’t pleasant. It was possible he was the innocent victim he claimed to be, as street people are often not treated as well as your average citizen by police, but the Listerine scent suggested he was inebriated and had probably been belligerent.

He asked me if I had any spare change and I said no. He asked two people who walked by us the same question. Having no success he became conversational again and offered me a vending machine sandwich he had. I thanked him but said no. He offered me a can of pop that was still chilled. Thanking him I took it. A minute later he asked me if I was sure I didn’t have any change. I began to smile as I realized how smoothly he had switched from panhandling to salesmanship despite his intoxication. Apologizing for not having much I handed him about eighty cents in loose change. He thanked me and began to wheel himself back toward the emergency entrance. Another piece of product that would not fit well into the machine’s processing. A short time later a taxi arrived and the driver helped him out of the chair and into the front seat before taking him away.

It was quiet at the bench then and my thoughts turned back to my own situation. I began to feel a bit of anxiety about the prospect of needing treatment for a hernia. I decided it would be best to just let the doctors tell me what the problem was first and think about it then. I also wondered about the street people and familiar faces I saw there. Their problems did not seem like emergencies to me, but then, neither did mine. Perhaps, like a lot of people in London, they did not have family doctors to go to. Of course, I did have a doctor and still ended up there.

Next on my agenda was to locate the Tim Horton’s. Following the directions I had been given, I arrived at the third-floor food court. Not only was Timmies there but a few other food outlets as well and a number of glass-fronted coolers with fruit salads and cold drinks. It was a large area including the seating with only a few customers at that time. I ate two slices of pizza and drank a bottle of coke before returning to the waiting room.