How do you feel?

I remember this from Surgery, 2001. Your whole life becomes about you. The entirety of your interactions with others revolves around your "current condition," as if your health were an hourly weather forecast. You become "The Neck" (in 2001), or "The Cancer" (current incarnation). People can't help it, they are being nice when they say "How are you?" even when you're a stranger. Friends are concerned, the family is worried. The convention is to assure everyone "I'm fine, I'm good, I'm better," which are all true statements. The temptation though, is to fine-tune a fantasy response in my head that would only be categorized as what my kids call TMI--too much information.

The TMI response is completely inappropriate in almost every situation, but because I have a perverse sense of humor, it's a mental game that amuses me. Succumbing to actual voicing of this response would be cruel in most cases, but I had an opportunity to do so yesterday in a context which appeared, at first blush, to be appropriate. So for those of you who are also easily and perversely amused, I will share:

I felt well enough to drive to the health food store yesterday, and just bad enough to make the drive a necessary outing. My goal was to score a probiotic supplement to help repopulate my intestinal flora & fauna after the ravages of antibiotics. By the time I got to the bottom of the driveway (one-quarter mile), I was wondering if I could make it to the west end of town and back without moving my arms while turning the steering wheel. Nope. Probably not. So let's do this gently, shall we?

I made it safely to the store and managed to put on the parking brake (well, just one click, but it's on, OK?), got my active-cultures-in-a-bottle, and was chatted up by the Australian woman who owns the store. "What kind of surgery did you have?" she asked kindly. When I told her "mastectomy," she leaned in and said, oddly, "My best friend just had a hysterectomy, and she said it felt like she had been [sotto voce] gutted like a fish! -- what do you feel like?" she asked eagerly.

Here was an opportunity to tell the whole truth, to formulate in my own mind an accurate description of what this REALLY feels like, to a person who had the misfortune or ineptitude of asking a specific question that I could answer with personal experience and authority!

"It feels like I was whacked repeatedly across the chest with a red-hot iron train rail by a 3-ton ogre with anger-management issues," I said cheerfully. "I thought so," my shopkeeper nodded sagely. "So, how about some mineral drops with that?"

I thought my response was honest, funny and clever. She seemed non-plussed, way too matter-of-fact. I felt like a comic who flopped on opening night.

The good news is that I made it safely home with my probiotics, and am healing quite nicely.

So for anyone who asks, I'm fine. I'm good. I'm feeling better. Thank you.