A Shot In The Ass

When I was a a kid, I would get strep throat quite often. The fevers, the aching, the flaming red throats were such a common occurrence with me, one could assume that I was carrier of this ailment; the Typhoid Mary of throat infections.

And each and every time I got sick, my mother would be there to take care of me. She would always make me a lemon rind broth sweetened with honey when I told her my throat didn't feel well, and, then, the next day, would keep me out of school and trudge me to the pediatric clinic at Gouverneur Hospital where she worked as a nurse's aid in their OB/GYN clinic. There I would visit a wonderful doctor with the surname Behrouzi.

Judging by the name, I imagine that the good doc was either Iraqi, Iranian, or Turkish, but his nationality is really of no import. He was a sweetheart of a man to whose care my mother trusted my throat infections and any other ailments I contracted. But as wonderful Dr. Behrouzi's bedside manner was, I came to dread the "strep throat" visits because it usually meant a shot of penicillin in the ass with a very looooooong syringe. Well, what I remember may be far from the reality, but the pain I recall tells me it was a big fucking needle. Ouch.

To hear Mom tell the story, I would literally cry a river at the prospect of getting that ass shot. In hindsight it seems rather ridiculous to cry over a two-second shot of penicillin, but I swear to you that each one felt as though the nurses were plunging the syringe into my ass cheek then rotating it back and forth to make sure it scraped against as many nerve endings as they possibly could without making me lose consciousness. Trust me, waterboarding is a softball Q&A session compared to this torture. In fact, when I told my mother this past Friday that I would be writing a post about the penicillin shots, she said in Spanish "don't forget to write that it took three nurses to hold you down." As much as I want to, I didn't forget that part, Ma.

There is a point in retelling this story. It's that through all the pain and suffering I've endured in this life -- and I'll try and keep my perspective here because I am cognizant of those who've endured much worse -- my dear mother was always there to comfort the pain, but never one to keep me from it. In fact, this was always Ma's MO with any situation I needed to deal with. Whether it was praying the rosary or suffering the occasional strapping from my father or having my tender heart ripped out by the latest love of my life, she would always let me get my ass kicked first, then pick me up and dust me off. I could never thank her enough for doing that.

The truth is, I never fully understood why my mother was this way. I never found her love to be lacking in any way, and as mothers go, she was as tender as any normal mother would be with her kids. Whenever, you asked she would let you rest your head on her lap while she scratched your scalp and sang a lullaby. And like most mothers, she would always defend you in public and chastise in private -- that is, unless it was a school setting, then all bets are off.

But unlike most mothers I observe these days, including E., she was never one to shield her children from those events in life they needed to face. For me, those events included getting my quarterly ass shot of penicillin as a kid, and, later on in life (age 19 to be exact), making me call a doctor to get treatment for the clap, after a night of unprotected, drunken sex with a girl I barely knew. When I called to make that appointment, not only did I suffer the embarrassment of telling the doctor's assistant and the doctor what was wrong, it took another shot in the ass of antibiotics to clear it all up. When I got home from the doctor, she slapped my upside my head and told me I was an idiot for not using condoms. As an OB/GYN nurse's aid at an inner city clinic, my mother knew more than she let on about STDs and unwanted pregnancies, yet she never felt the need for any pre-emptive chastising. I know for certain that she would have done so had she understood in 1983 the devastation that HIV would wreak on the world, but hindsight is always 20/20. She always did the best she could by us, and still does.

She much older now and becoming more frail with the passing years. My irrational hope is that she'll live forever, but the reality is she is in the twilight of her years. These days when I visit her and my dad down in Central New Jersey, she's still the first to greet us at the door and stuff a $5 bill into the grandkids hands, even though she probably can't afford it. After she's told us the latest family saga and served up a huge plate of arroz con gandules, she would retreat to her bedroom to watch her "telenovelas" on one of the Spanish-language TV stations or watch re-runs of Bonanza on TV Land to re-live her crush on Michael Landon (Little Joe).

Despite her frailty, the sparkle in her eyes gives testament to the spirit of her being. One look into those soulful brown eyes, one affectionate scalp rub, one lilting lullaby is all the comfort I need to assuage me for all the shots in the ass I've taken lately, and for all the ones I've endured on my way to being a grown man. I can't thank her enough for all she's done for me, and somehow telling her "thanks alot, Ma" just doesn't seem to cut it.