Moonhole

July 13, 2009

"Hey," said the foot doctor when he came into the examination room, ready to remove my staples. "You're all alone today."

Deborah had accompanied me on my previous two visits and, apparently, she'd made an impression.

"My wife?" I said. "Are you kidding? She's so over my broken foot."

"So you're on your own?"

"That's about the size of it," I said. "Actually, she's off running errands."

"Turn your foot a little this way," he said. "This might hurt a bit." He began wriggling a pair of wire cutters under the first of my surgical staples, then snipped it in the middle and pried out the two halves. He quickly proceeded down the line, finishing with all ten in less than a minute. "Looks good," he said, poking at the incision scab. "Grab your crutches and go across the hall. We'll get an X-ray."

The doctor went to do something — check on another patient, I imagine, or do whatever the hell it is doctors do when they walk out of an examination room. Check his email, maybe? A technician met me at the X-ray machine.

"Just put your foot up here and relax," she said, as if I didn't already know the drill. "Just relax and pretend you're on vacation." She adjusted the position of my foot and took a picture. "If you could be anywhere on vacation right now, where would you be?" she said, turning my foot for another angle.

I didn't even need to think about it. " Moonhole," I said. I'd been thinking about Moonhole ever since discovering it online a couple of weeks ago.

"Moonhole?" she said, making a face as if I'd just said something dirty. "What the heck is Moonhole ?"

"It's in the Caribbean somewhere, I don't know exactly, I just found out about it. But it's a cluster of dwellings carved out of rocks, totally open, no doors or windows. Everything is carved out of rocks, like the Flintstones, the walls, the furniture —"

"It must keep cool that way."

"That's what they say. It was originally built in the '60s as a community of private residences. Some people still live there, I think — at least part-time. But other parts of it have been turned into vacation rentals. I have no idea how expensive it is, I didn't see it mentioned anywhere on the website. It could be a zillion dollars for all I know, but it looks awesome."

"What's it called again? Moon-something?"

"Moonhole."

"I'm going to check it out online. I just want to see what this place looks like. If it's nice, I'll just look at the pictures and fantasize. That's about the only vacation I can afford right now."

"I hear you," I said.

"I've been playing the lottery, though."

"Me too."

"You win anything yet?"

"No, you?"

"No."

The doctor returned and took a look at the pictures. "Looks good," he said. Half of the original break appeared to be completely healed, at least to my untrained eye, but the other half still had a big gap in it. "That'll fill in eventually," he said. "You've been using the bone stimulator. right?"

"Bone stimulator?" I said. "No. I forgot all about it."

The doctor did, too, apparently. He had mentioned something about a bone stimulator before I had the surgery, but he never mentioned it again, and I never asked.

"Okay," he said. "We'll see if we can set you up. Someone will call you about it. In the meantime, you can start putting a little weight on that foot. Take it easy, don't overdo it, just play it by ear and see how you do. You can try using one crutch, or you might want to pick up a cane somewhere."

When I met Deborah later and told her about my appointment, she got excited about buying a cane. "Where are we going to find one?" she wondered.

"I don't know, but I prefer something in mahogany with a silver handle. Or maybe something carved out of ivory. A skull, perhaps."

"Nice."

"Even better than that, did I tell you that he’s getting me a bone stimulator?"

"A bone stimulator ?" she laughed. "What's that ?"

"Don't play coy with me."