DEAR KEVIN A. KLOCKENGA, CEO & MOST HIGH HOLY MUCKY-MUCK CEO OF HENRY MAYO NEWHALL HOSPITAL — First, Kevin, phew. I wish The Signal paid me by the word. After typing your name and title, I could buy a Slurpee. I’m writing you today on a very delicate and private matter. I’d like to ask you for your hospital’s hand in marriage. After my recent stay in ICU, except for some soupy oatmeal, I’m profoundly lovestruck.
I wish there were some outside forces to blame, an unripened 2-pound jalapeno eaten raw. Shark bite. But, alas, no. The fault was all mine. I was taken to emergency, midnight-ish, six minutes before my birthday, two weeks ago. I’ve been an expert diabetic the past 20-plus years, although, while I’m asking for favors, I’d prefer if you guys over there on McBean would refer to my stubbornness as, “Live-abetes.”
“Diabetes?” So dour. My blood sugar level was flirting with 500. Same as North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. I seem to recall we’re supposed to be at 100. On the bright side, word got out and everyone on staff jumped into Hawaiian shirts and rushed down to take selfies with me because evidently 500 is only normal for Willie Wonka.
A couple years ago, I was visited by some 8-pound microbe, part-COVID, part zombie bite. One night, I was passed out on the floor, crawling toward my cellphone to call for an ambulance. I was light years beyond ill and entertained the notion that — this — might be — it. Sobering and clear, the things beyond thoughts that visit. I’ve always believed in that part of the Our Father prayer — “… on Earth as it is in Heaven.” I felt peace. Companionship in a wonderfully simple way and capital letter. There is only One who knows if I were dying or not. I sure had the sense I was close. Then, there was my Reap What You Sow visit to your wonderful sanctuary of healing.
I was in ICU at HMNH for days then transferred to general prison population and the charts and tests will share tales of maladies with 186 letters. Honestly? I was admitted for being stubborn. Since I was a latch key kid, I enjoyed the diet of a coyote. I’d eat anything. Twinkies for dinner. Decades were washed down by a daily six-pack of Coke or four. I’d pour salt on a hot dog. I’d trim the meat off bacon and eat the fat and fight raccoons in neighborhood trash bins for tossed-out month-old birthday cake boxes. Pizza at 3 in the morning. I didn’t just want to eat 50 bucks’ worth of Taco Bell. I wanted to crouch in the branch of a tree above the path Taco Bell took to visit the stream’s edge for a drink of water, pounce on Taco Bell, kill it, THEN eat it. Chiquita
Landfill begrudgingly listed me as their chief competitor. Then, a friend rushed me to emergency. I was loopy (more than normal) and my pal had to correct the admission record because I certainly am not J. Alfred Prufrock. Never have been. Never will be.
You know, Kevin? The waiting room had maybe 50 fellow suffering souls and I thought I’d be seeing someone in early June 2027. From the moment I checked in to staff wheeling me in took less than a couple minutes and not once did a fetching (female) nurse suggest, “Let’s pull down Boston’s designer undies and paint his feet and unmentionables with iodine so that when, or if, he wakes, he’ll think he died and woke up in Hell.”
I did get asked a lot of questions, not once along the lines of, “What the holy heck is wrong with you?”
It is an interesting question, one I feel that I’ve answered over the years in this column. It seemed I was meeting someone new every 4.5 minutes and had to explain what I was doing in their bed. It’s sort of like minding your own business and a grizzly bear breaks into your cabin, completely trashes the place, eats your beloved computer with your life’s work in it, mauls you severely, then chases you to the river where you fall in and get washed downstream 10 miles where you stumble to shore and there, waiting, is an insurance adjuster who asks, “Did you get a chance to fill out those forms I sent last month?”
Then, another, albeit sweet soul, shows up at bedside and you’ve got to retell the grizzly bear story all over again. Because you’re on death’s door, you can’t be a wise guy and say you accidentally swallowed a goldfish in the HMNH cafeteria because they’ll monkey with your medication and drip lines.
All kidding aside, Kev? I marveled at so many qualities your hospital possessed. Beyond being staggeringly well-organized, adept, veteran and efficient, Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital was loving. Loving in these climes can be such a rare thing. Loving is when someone asks you, “How are you?” then stands there to look you in the eye, patiently waits, actually listens and “gets you.” I was struck by your staff’s compassion and heart-warming sense of humor. A nurse, technician or doctor would visit and it was like seeing a dear family member.
Love is a much-bandied and commercialized word these days. Love is not an emotion. Love is not a feeling. It’s a behavior. Same thing with health care. There’s pills and sutures, IVs and operating tables, brains transplanted and shoulders reset. But, to care for someone, as if they belonged to you, that is something that will never appear on any questionnaire.
I came to your emergency with an emergency. Your hospital not only saved my life, it changed it. I am grateful for that and, in amends, I must now follow their example, cherishing my own life as your staff has.
With more than 11,000 columns and 100-plus awards, Santa Clarita’s John Boston is the most prolific humorist/satirist in world history. Visit his bookstore online at johnlovesamerica.com/bookstore.
