My orthopaedic surgeon

When I rounded the pair number 500 in my shoe collection, my atheist of a husband became religious. He needed help to get me stopped and didn’t have any other means left than praying to God. As God is always excited when he gets new members to his heavenly club, he is ready to suck up the newcomers by filling their wishes. It is like a book club, you get the first three books of your choice free, then there is only crap coming in your mailbox once a month.

So God gave me a year ago problems with my right foot little toe, and I haven’t (almost) been buying new shoes since. Instead I have been a regular customer at my orthopaedic surgeon who loves to cut tendons over in my toe. This is a never-ending story, so last week I was again visiting my orthopaedic surgeon. He is a weird man, never looks one in the eyes, and talks to himself all the time. When he studies my foot, he doesn’t place it on a table but simply lifts my foot up between his legs. I must say I feel quite awkward having my toes separated from his balls just by a thin layer of clothing; he is probably not even wearing any underwear. Just like Hemingway. Yes, Hemingway didn’t wear underwear. I have an amazing ability to remember only irrelevant details from any biography I read, and this I remember about Hemingway. Like the only thing I remember after reading Simone de Beauvoir’s biography is, that during the Second World War she often ate rotten meat, and Sartre being quite discussed by this once had to throw a rotten rabbit out of the window. It is most likely that at this particular moment Jean-Paul saw the light of existentialism. While waving the rotten rabbit at the window, he claimed: “L'existence précède l'essence”; this rabbit could possibly not have been born stinking and rotten but it was a choice it had taken after being shot and sent from the countryside to Paris.

As you can understand, I don’t believe in existentialism. I am born this way, with all my character faults, and therefore not responsible for any of my actions. And every misfortune I certainly blame on God, like my lack of focus again (God created Mr T.).

So my orthopaedic surgeon is studying my toe and talking to himself. I am very ticklish so every time he touches my foot, I involuntarily move my toes (which are separated from his balls just by a thin layer of clothing). At some point this becomes too much for him and suddenly he throws my foot up so I hit my heel hardly on his desk. “What the f… are you doing that for? “ I complain, but he is already busy talking to his Dictaphone. He avoids facing me and just tells me to book a new time at the reception. Before leaving I have a last desperate look at him, but can only see his profile. Which for some reason makes me think about a famous scene in “Crying game”.