Chapter 78
Eyes May Reject Donor Juice

Today my mom went to get her eyes fixed. You know, that new laser surgery they do to correct people’s vision. They say to allow for a two hour appointment so when we showed up at 2:30 we expected her to go under the beam by 3:30 or 4 so that we would be done with our two hour appointment by the two hour mark. Instead we sat in the lobby until about 4:15 sitting mostly in silence while I read People magazine cover to cover and she read Better Homes and Gardens. I am very up to date on everything that has occurred in Malibu, Hollywood, and in the movies. I even read through the lamest book reviews that I have ever encountered in that magazine. Who knows, maybe the books were just that lame and there was no hope that the reviewer could make it any better. Meanwhile my mom found some recipes for fish that seemed to be exciting for her.
Finally we get called into a room where they “prep” her. Basically they gave her a silly looking cap to put over her hair and they put some sort of absorber over her ears so that when the drops were put into her eyes (the ones that were going to quickly slid unto her face and down towards her ears while she lay there) wouldn’t get her ears wet. In the prep room the lady tells my mom, and I suppose me as well, everything that she is going to need to do post-op. Then we are escorted into the more comfortable room which had a little fountain in it which actually tensed me up more than calmed me. Oddly enough it made my wrist hurt and my bladder feel full, I wanted to rip the cord out of the wall to make it quit. Especially since we were left there alone and my mom was nervous and I kept saying all the wrong things; things like “Hope the laser doesn’t slip” which I actually never said but the things coming out of my mouth might as well have been because each time I said something like that I realized that my mom was already nervous and I was making it worse. So we sat in silence mostly listening to the gurgling of that little fountain. Then a doctor came in and started to go over my mom’s record, or something like it, and kept asking her questions and I am sitting there wondering why these questions weren’t asked before they said it was okay for her to get the operation. If she answered incorrectly were they going to tell her that couldn’t get it done? And if so were they going to pay for our time and inconvenience, because my life was slowly sucked out into the pages of People Magazine. The doctor tells us how the procedure will unfold and I am trying not to gag because as usual I am picturing things worse then they really will be. He tells her the she will feel some pressure around her eyes because he is going to be putting a device around it to keep it open and then everything is going to go black…why is it going to go black? My only thought is that it’s because they are going to remove her eye from her head to do the operation and by doing so it’s going to disconnect the wiring that gives her sight and then I get this mental image of my mom’s eye hanging from the socket. I almost threw up. Then he was talking about the end of the procedure (the entire thing is only suppose to take about ten minutes) and he said that she might smell something and I almost said, “Because it will be the smell of you eye matter being seared by the laser” but I caught myself for two reasons, mom was really nervous by now and the doctor was in the room. Mostly it was because the doctor was in the room, what kind of daughter would I look like?
Then they finally take her into the room which is set up more like a fishbowl than an operating room. From the lobby I, as well as everyone else, could witness my mother’s operation and could look at her eyes on a television screen as they cut and paste them. I however did not look up. I stared at the carpet and contemplated what “beauty” really is. Odd, I know, but you know, it’s either that or how much my life sucks right now because all the college kids are going back to school in the next couple of weeks and I have to stay here, eating my feelings and working at a grocery store with a B.S. in Sociology.
I don’t think I got the position of trainer at work. I had an interview last week and they were suppose to call me this week to let me know and here it is Friday and I never got a phone call. It’s for the best really. All week I was hoping I wouldn’t get it so the fact that I haven’t received a phone call actually relieves me a bit. I would have been sucked in more to a job that I don’t really enjoy. Of course now that I have just said all of this watch them call me on Monday to tell me I got it. What will I do? I would hope turn it down but if it were actually offered I just might take it, I need the money. So hopefully they don’t call me, hopefully someone will call from the place I applied to last week. Unfortunately for me the only people who seem to want me are the ones who want me to join the world of earning a commission. Screw that! I will not work a job that has commission. I have a college degree, please someone help me use it!
Wow, this is why I contemplated what beauty really is instead of my life. But now it’s exactly what I did, dang-it. Well, since I’m on that track I might as well continue. Back to my roommates I suppose. They are nice enough but I think I’m just enough anti-social to drive them away. I didn’t mean to do it, I promise. I went to see their skit in a little talent show with an audience of maybe 20 or 30 people. It (their skit) was pretty cute. I only caught the end of the whole show which from what I hear I’m lucky I missed. I hate activities like that, people, especially young adults between the ages of 18-29 are not interested in sharing their talents or watching the few that do embarrass themselves. Besides there is only good turnouts for those types of things in a college ward, where there aren’t many other options of things to do, and they are usually held on a Tuesday or a Wednesday, I mean, what else is there to do on those days?