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Writer's pictureROGER H. TALL, M.D.

DOWNSTAIRS, UPSTAIRS


Have you ever used the word “clinker” in a sentence? If you are speaking to someone under 50, you will need to explain noisy, clinker-generating coal furnaces. As I tell my exceptional grandchildren about heating with coal they look at me with vacant stares, wondering why anyone would ever heat their homes that way. As a teenager, I heard my parents talk about heating their childhood homes with wood stoves and fireplaces, so when I was assigned to clean the furnace and take out the clinkers, I figured that it was better than cutting, hauling, splitting, and stacking wood. High-tech natural gas furnaces ended the need to mess around with wood and coal and clinkers. Other than how I look in the mirror, I haven’t seen a clinker for decades. On the downside, modern furnaces suck the water out of the air and leave me with dry skin. After years of itching, I discovered a whipped petroleum product with a manly almond scent that worked better than anything I had used before — if I put it on right after showering. I was so impressed that I bought ten tubes for $1 each at the dollar store.


When the first tube was empty, I remembered that the new tubes were in the basement. So I looked around the bathroom, thinking that one of MK’s fancy skin creams might work. MK has many creams with use-restricted labels for her feet and her eyes and face and hands, but none seemed to be designed for general application. It struck me that if I used one or more of these creams that I would soon be walking into the operating room smelling like a woman’s spa, and I decided that would lead to too much confusion. So, I trotted down the stairs to hunt for a fresh tube of my manly-man skin cream — and you don’t get dressed just to go downstairs and then immediately undress to apply skin cream after returning to the bathroom. It just made more sense to me to wander around the house naked. Men are like that.


MK heard me and called out in a sweet drawl, when I was half-way down the stairs, “Oh, R-o-g-e-r, would you please get me a Diet Coke while you are in the basement?” To which I replied, “Sho-nuff, Sweetie Pie, Honey-bunch.” I soon found myself naked as a Jaybird, standing in front of an open refrigerator, with a cold Diet Coke in my hand, not remembering why I had gone downstairs in the first place. Upstairs, MK could hear my grumpy mutterings and called down, asking me if I needed any help. In my big voice, I told her that before she distracted me with her request for a Diet Coke, I had been on a mission for something in the basement, and because I was distracted finding what she wanted from the basement, I could not remember why I had gone downstairs in the first place. This seemed to delight her. In an overly cheery voice, she called down to me, explaining that she had a solution. She said, “Oh, Roger, just trot right back up here to where you were when you decided to go downstairs and it will all come back to you.” If she had known that I was sans suit, I am sure she would not have been so generous and supportive. Most certainly she would have added something about why clothes are our friends—women are like that.


Sure enough! I tromped back up the stairs and into the bathroom where I saw the empty skin cream tube that had started all the fuss. To assure success, I hurried back down the stairs while I could still remember why I was going down there—and for a second time, I could see no reason to put any clothes on. As I was taking the new tube of skin cream up the stairs, I passed MK coming down the stairs, dressed in her new, yet-to-be famous Blue Robe. As I passed, she said, in an amused and teasing tone, “Oh, Roger, have you lost weight?” Not wanting to discuss anything at that moment, I kept climbing up the stairs in naked silence. This gave her just enough time to pose another probing question that I did not want to answer, “Have you been working out?” The almond-scented skin cream was applied and my dry skin was relieved, however, my bruised ego took considerably longer to heal. Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.


Note to self: Don’t complain out loud when you choose to go naked into the basement and cannot remember why you are there -- unless you like that kind of attention.



Ever vigilant,


RT




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