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For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life. – Ephesians 2:10

This is a tale of two trips to medical, and the difference a little humanity and compassion can make.

I take blood pressure medicine. I have for many years now. So when I arrived at this facility in March 2014, a nurse from the welcome wagon noticed this fact in my chart and took my blood pressure. I had been shackled on a bus for the longest part of that day, and I’d just been told that I was going to the
hole for an undetermined amount of time because the facility had no open beds. So when the nurse told me my b.p. was 145 over 87, “a little high,” I replied, “I wouldn’t know why.” She blinked at me and stated that they’d have to keep an eye on it.

Fast forward to May 2015. Fourteen months had flown by here at Camp Cupcake, and nobody had checked my blood pressure, even though I have been to medical numerous times. I was still taking my blood pressure medicine, the generic of something ending in “…vil” or “…pril” and manufactured in India. But while I had received everything from TB tests to Hepatitis B vaccination shots, nobody had checked my blood pressure.

One beautiful day, when I had the afternoon off from work and was dressed to go out to yard, the block CO told me that I needed to go to medical. So it was good-bye sunshine and fresh air, and hello medical waiting area for an appointment of unknown purpose. The purpose, as it turned out, was to meet with a physician’s assistant (P.A.) who told me that the reason I was asked to come to medical because of “routine” monitoring for my high blood pressure.
“That’s funny,” I said.
“What’s funny?” the P.A. asked.
“You said ‘routine’.”
“What is that funny?” she asked as she flipped through my medical chart.
“Because routine means regularly,” I replied. She stared at me a second with a look that said, “Shut up, you stupid inmate, and let me do my job,” and then returned to flipping through my chart. I knew what she was looking for the last blood pressure reading. And I knew that she wasn’t going to find it. That’s dramatic irony.

After going through nearly every page in the file, she said, “Hmmm. That’s… odd.” I swear she was about to say “funny” instead of “odd” but did not want to echo the stupid inmate. Of course, I did not have to ask what was odd. “How long have you been here?” she asked. I told her 14 months. “And when did we do your clinic?”
“My what?”
“Your physical.”
I explained that I had never had a physical at this prison, and that my blood pressure had only been checked on the evening I arrived.
“And you’re still taking blood pressure medicine?”
“Every day.”
“We’re supposed to check it every six months.”
And that, I thought, is why the word “routine” was funny.
“Did you ask anybody to check your blood pressure?”
Oh no. I saw where this was going. It was going to be the stupid inmate’s fault for not taking a more proactive role in his own healthcare. So I looked at her with all the politeness I could muster, and asked, “Could you take my blood pressure, please?”

So the P.A. checked my blood pressure – 132 over 85. That’s a little high, but not too bad. We’ll check it again in six months.” She pulled out her stethoscope and gave me an abbreviated physical, which meant listening to my heart and lungs and recording my height and weight. She pointed to a chart on the wall of BMI and told me that I was obese, which is always nice to hear. And then she said, “You’re done,” which is apparently her form of “see ya later.”

A week later I was called back up to medical, once again for purpose unknown. Before you begin to think the medical waiting area is like a doctor’s office waiting room, let me give you the picture. Remember the long wooden benches from your high school locker room? Four of those. And no TV or magazines or elevator music. If you bring anything along to read they will yell at you to put it away. So you sit on a wooden bench, sometimes for hours, and wait for the CO to call your name. There are two posters on the wall. One is about the global spread of Hepatitis C. The other is a collage that shows rotten teeth from chewing tobacco and smoking and failing to brush and floss. And then there’s the sign that says “Keep Feet Off Walls.” I still haven’t figured out how I could position myself on the long wooden benches
to place my feet on the walls.

When your name is called, it’s not the smiling nurse that summons you with, “Mr. Moore, the doctor will see you now.” It’s the grouchy CO who says, “Moore,” and then gropes you in the obligatory contraband patdown.

So after about half and hour of staring at pictures of rotting teeth, I was sent back to door number 3 where I was told to stand and wait for the nurse. After a few minutes the nurse, a woman around 60 years or so, came to the door and asked me why I was there. “I don’t know,” I said.
“Well, let’s see,” she said and looked at a computer printout. “EKG. Does that sound right?”
“If you say so, ” I said.
“Did you see the doctor recently?” she asked. I explained that I had seen the P.A. “And she didn’t tell you she was ordering an EKG?” I said no. “Well, that’s what we’re going to do today. Do you know what an EKG is?” I said I did. “Good. So go ahead and take off both shirts and lie down on the table.”

The table was a wooden exam table that looked like it came from a discount furniture store. It was made out of wood, or fake wood, and it wiggled when I put my hand on it. When I climbed up on top and slid back to lie down, it shook like it would collapse.

“Don’t worry, ” she said. “We haven’t lost anyone to the table yet.”

As the nurse hooded up the adhesive electrodes for the EKG, she told me that the table wasn’t the only thing that needed some work. The EKG machine was temperamental, and lately had refused to print results. While she hooked me up, we made small talk. I told her about being from Erie. She said that she had been there and liked water and beaches. I told her about Sonia and the family going to Topsail Island last summer for vacation. She said that she often stayed on Topsail and loved it there.

She asked me about my work on the street, and I told her about being in marketing communications, advertising, public relations, and things like that. She gathered my vital info: last name, first name, DOC#, date of birth, height, weight. And she typed it all into the machine, which started to do its
work with the push of a button. A few seconds later the nurse said, “Hmm. It says you are a flatline. Your heart is still beating, right?” Regardless of which buttons she pushed or which cables she checked, the machine pretended not to hear my heart.

So with some more small talk, she restarted the machine and once again entered my vital information. This time the device successfully detected my heartbeat, but soon after stopped doing anything at all. “Hmm. You’re in standby mode,” she said.
“That’s the truth,” I replied. She smiled, and I smiled back.
“You’re not like the typical inmate,” she said.
“Thank you,” I replied. She chuckled.

Once again with small talk ongoing, she restarted the machine, reentered my info, and pressed the start button. The third time was indeed the charm, and soon she had the printed results in hand. As she pulled off the adhesive electrodes form my skin, she said:
“It’s hard to be kind to some inmates in here. But it’s what I try to do because I’m a Christian. I had one guy that kept pretending to be crazy. He had heard that if you were crazy, you would be -given automatic SSI benefits when you got out. So when he came to see me, he would rant and rave and try to convince me he was crazy. One day he said, “Every time I come in here I’m mean and call you all kinds of names and you’re always nice to me. Why?” I told him about being a Christian and how I believe I am
to treat all people with kindness. He said, “There’s a lot of people work in here call themselves Christians, always talking about where they went to church on Sunday and all that. And they
don’t act like you. We’re inmates. We’re dirt. We’re nothing to them. So what is it with you?”

“So I told him that it may sound odd, but he is a brick to me. “A brick?” he said. Yes. A brick, I said. God has planned all these things for me to do on my journey to heaven, and you and each person I meet in life is another brick on that road. And each day I move further on my journey and I try to do what
God wants, and I try to treat people in the way God wants, and those bricks add up on my road. It’s a long road. I like to think that God has a lot left for me to do. A lot more bricks to place along my path.”

“Did the guy pretending to be crazy understand that?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. But in the end it doesn’t really matter if he understands or not. I’m still called to be kind and caring.”
“Compassionate,” I added.
“Compassionate,” she repeated.

And that’s the difference between two visits to medical. With the P.A. it was, “You’re here and I’m supposed to take care of you, and by the way, you’re obese.” With the nurse, it was,
“You’re here, and I care.”

What good works has God prepared for you? What bricks are there for you to build your road to heaven? How are you living out a life of compassion? It makes a difference. Believe me, it makes a difference.