Okay, I've wanted it to rain. It's been really hot.  But today is just so gloomy and doomy, not at all the sort of day I want it to be to take the little angel to get her ears examined.

I am still nervous about this whole tube thing.  Hopefully they will be able to allay my fears. I am the daughter of a woman often accused of hypochondria.  She is not really a hypochondriac, my mother, she's just very aware.  Thankfully, that very awareness helped her discover cancer early and she's still around today.  That whole incident has fed my own hyperawareness and general malaise on the subject of health.

Earlier this week, for instance, I was exiting the post office on the way to Large Corporate Telecom, when a woman came screeching up in her minivan.  "Do you know you have a brown recluse bite?" she asked, her eyes rolling wildly.

"I know I have a bite," I said.  "I think it would be flesh-eating by now if it were a brown recluse."  (This was false bravado - I had been on WebMD the night before looking up brown recluse bites.)

"I had one of those last year," she said.  "It's a brown recluse. I'm sure of it. There's a ring around it."

So there I was, again struck by fear that I had been working all morning on ridding myself of.  Damn people!  Why is my sense of denial not more well developed? 

So I sat through this meeting at Large Corporate Telecom certain my flesh would be disappearing at any minute.  I tried to go to Large Corporate Telecom emergency clinic, but after letting me sit there for twenty minutes, the receptionist looked down at the form and said, "Oh, we only treat people who work here."  Even though there was a box for "contractor" on the form.  Nice. 

Then I drove to the mall, where there is another urgent-care clinic.  "Have you been here since December?" the receptionist asked.  "Probably not, huh?"

But of course I have been there since December!  I almost died in February in Cambridge, Mass.!  I had to have a breathing treatment and the pharmacist pronounced me the sickest human he'd ever seen walking!  "Yes," I said.  "Actually, I have."

"Well, you're lucky then," she said.  "You get to fill out the short form." 

Lucky?

By the time I got back into the little room, I was starting to feel silly.  The doctor came in, I told her my story, she looked at the bite.  "You have a strongish allergic reaction to whatever bit you," she said.  "It's okay."

"I feel silly," I said.  "It's just that my little girl..." AND I STARTED CRYING!

WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

The doctor was very kind.  "When you become a mother, you start worrying about all sorts of strange things, don't you?" she asked kindly.  "I can't even watch commercials anymore.  It's okay."

The whole crying jag was over as soon as it started, but then I felt stupid on compounded levels.  I thanked the nice doctor, gathered my things, and headed back to Large Corporate Telecom to continue behaving as though I really am a sophisticated professional.  (sniff)