America's Next Top ER Visit
Gilmore Girls lied to me!
I’ve never been in a hospital waiting room before. The only experiences I have are secondhand, via extremely realistic television shows like Gilmore Girls or Secret Life of the American Teenager. In those shows, the waiting room is a place where a kind, organized staff is ready for you, people flit in and out to declare their feelings for each other and perform Grand Gestures, and there is overhead lighting.
Like, I’m sorry, are those suede chairs?! Who are we fooling!
I should clarify, I’ve never been in a hospital waiting room before recently. Let me say off the bat, I AM FINE. I am fine. I won’t get into specifics but I had to spend a while in the ER on a Friday night, just as I always imagined my 20s would be like, except I was not there for breaking an arm skateboarding or something cool (?) like that. No, instead I sat in that waiting room and uhhh waited, and hoo boy, did that waiting room undercut my expectations.
Maybe all emergency rooms are like this, maybe the experience was exacerbated by the fact that it was late on a Friday night, maybe it’s Maybelline. One thing that I learned quickly, though, was that there is a battle to the top of the pyramid happening in that waiting room, fighting to be the main character. I feel for everyone else who was there that night. It was chaotic, it was loud, and about 50% of people were talking on the phone at any given moment, and I know that the thing we all had in common is that we wanted to be told we’re OK.
The environment was at the same time pure chaos and exceedingly dull. As we all sat, compelled by the hour and lack of other stimulation to watch the old school TV in the center of the room playing an adult animation block on Adult Swim, I felt the shifting power dynamics running like currents all throughout the very dimly lit room. The waiting room felt akin to waiting for the results in America’s Next Top Model or Dance Moms. There’s a hierarchy… you wanna be on top?!
On TV, the main character in the ER waiting room is an estranged child making amends with their parent, a lover proving their loyalty once and for all, a friend pacing in the smack dab middle of all the chairs waiting for an update. In this waiting room, it was anything but. So, without further ado, I present to you: the contestants for the Main Character of the ER That Time I Went There.
A lady who, when we first came inside, cut in front of me in the middle of me giving the intake nurse my name to ask for a mask. Good instincts, poor timing!
The child, maybe 7 or 8, who was sitting nearby, attentively watching the Adult Swim cartoons on the TV. Throughout the night they played American Dad, Rick & Morty, and some god awful show about a dog that murders people. It was all god awful. I really hope that 80% of the dialogue just went over his head as it would have mine at that age. Now that I’m a grown up, only 30% goes over my head.
In a surprise appearance, the intake nurse herself! The second we walked in, she shouted with me barely in earshot, “YOU NEED A DOCTOR, HUH?” No ma’am, is this not Emporium?
The nurse who, when I told her I am a regular Pilates-doer (is there a word for that? Pilatestician? Pilatist? Insufferable?), said “Oh wow, that could never be me, it’s way too hard. I tried it and quit right away. I’m about to start CrossFit instead.” Good luck to her!
The teen who was there for someone else and was coordinating with a friend to come pick him up. “Yeah man, I can come out for a bit… Yeah, come pick me up… Nah, I’m at the hospital, dude… Nah, not like in the hospital, I’m in the waiting room, just pull around to the sign that says ‘Emergency’.” The audacity, the swagger! I cannot conjure the nonchalance that a call like this would require. So cool-headed! That kid’s going to be president.
A guy who came in and said he was okay but that his foot was “oozy.” I genuinely hope he’s okay, and he seemed like a nice man who was just sitting politely and minding his business when I overheard this. I just am going to now have to think about his oozy foot for the rest of my life. Pour one out for Oozy Foot Guy.
Last but not least is the man who came in and decided to be The Only Person Not Wearing a Mask, which are absolutely required in the waiting room. Not only that, but he had an incredible amount of generalized audacity. The man was watching TikToks on full volume on his phone, and absolutely fucking cackling. He developed a rapport with the staff, or perhaps he’s a frequent guest and is able to put faces to names these days. A true politician.
I was called back before the coronation of Main Character, so I guess I’ll never know who won. When we left, while waiting for an Uber, I saw a rat scurrying around just outside the hospital’s front doors. I have to imagine this is a Ratatouille situation and he is late for surgery.
It was a long night, and I hope everyone who sat in that waiting room that night is also doing okay today. I deeply hope everyone got good news. I hope that nurse is having fun at CrossFit. It’s an inherently stressful environment, but while we were there I also saw couples laughing while showing each other TikToks, a lady smiling and rocking her baby, and parents and children taking care of each other, sharing blankets from home and snacks from the vending machine. It’s nice to think that even in moments like that, in rooms we hope to not find ourselves in, we can still make time for each other.
I’ve gotten multiple automatic texts from the hospital over the last week asking me to rate my experience. Uh, it fuckin’ sucked, it was the hospital! It was very dark and beige! Perhaps I’ll just send them back the link to this essay, and see if we can’t come up with a way to formalize the process for selecting a Main Character.
Until then, stay happy, stay healthy.
Xo,
Caitlin
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