My eyes opened at 5:52 AM, as they normally do. My watch alarm is set for 6 AM, but I’m typically up by then, and I manually turn off the buzzing while I put in my contacts, hovering over the sink. I soon remembered that today, I cannot go downstairs and pour myself a cup of coffee; instead, I have to shower, get dressed, and get to the blood lab by 7 so I can be back home to work at 8.
I get my blood drawn every four months, which I sort of enjoy. I have been on an incretin mimetic for two-and-a-half years, and although I am not diabetic, I do have metabolic imbalances, and my doctor is overly cautious and wants to see my labs quarterly.
Because I get my blood tested so often, I’ve found a few tricks so I don’t have to sit around the waiting room. You see, the lab my doctor prefers me to use is one he’s a partner in, and because it’s within my insurance network, there are never any costs associated with it. The caveat is that there are no appointments; it’s walk-up only.
In 2023, I took the bait and walked over to the lab after a visit with my doctor, and I waited in the lobby for 90 minutes — never again. Now that I am in my 40s, I have a higher tolerance for most things, but waiting in a lobby with unmasked people while they cough, listen to OAN podcasts, and play Candy Crush at full volume does not fly with my temperament. I’ll start tapping my feet, biting my nails, as my blood pressure rises.
I put on my new, dark indigo jeans, black t-shirt, and denim jacket, which is not my normal attire for a July day in Southern California, but it is 6:25 AM after all.
The lab is close, only about a 12-minute drive, and sits on the same campus as Los Robles Hospital, a place I have visited a few times over the past decade. In 2019, only a few months after I quit drinking, I got up in the middle of the night to evacuate my bowels due to some pressure in my guts and noticed a splitting, sharp pain on my right side. The pain became so intense that I called my ex-girlfriend and asked her to take me to the ER — she told me to leave her alone and to call an ambulance.
I lived on the second floor, with stairs as the only access, and when the paramedics arrived, they asked if I could walk myself down, as getting the cot upstairs would be difficult. The pain was writhing so badly on the way to the hospital that I said my goodbyes to this life and was at peace with dying.
While strapped to the gurney, I asked one of the paramedics with a thick, bushy mustache, “Do you think I am gonna survive?”
”I’m not sure, buddy,” he replied. Looking back, that wasn’t very reassuring.
When we arrived, there was a crew of six waiting on me. Their first assessment was that my appendix had burst and would require an emergency appendectomy. While getting a CT Scan, I vomited all over myself, which would normally be embarrassing, but I just shrugged to the tech and said, “Sorry.”
I curled up into a ball after making it back to the examination room, squeezing the bedsheets into both fists and untucking them; it was the only way I could get comfortable. The curtain was only half closed, and I could hear others fighting drug withdrawal and broken bones.
Finally, they pumped me full of morphine, and the pain started to subside. Or at least, it became bearable.
The warmth was familiar.
Half an hour later, a doctor came into the room and let me know that I, in fact, was experiencing kidney stones, my appendix was intact, and I was at no risk for surgery. I would have a three-day script filled for hydrocodone, was told to follow up with my primary care physician and a urologist, and was sent on my way.
”I can just go home? Even in this amount of pain?”
The doctor said, “You sure can. You just can’t drive yourself.”
I sat on a bench in the circle drive of the ER, nodding in and out as I waited for my Uber to pick me up, and all I could think was, “God, I love opioids.”
I parked in a lot at the blood lab, only 50 yards from the entrance to the ER where I was discharged seven years earlier. I entered a side door, avoiding the courtyard entrance altogether, went up two flights of stairs, walked down a long hallway, turned right into the lab waiting room, and saw two people already waiting — an elderly man and woman, both Caucasian. It was 6:57 AM, and they had somehow already beaten me in line.
Singing could be heard from behind a closed door next to the check-in area, which sounded like biblical hymns in Spanish. I went to sign in, and the two names ahead of me had already been there for ten minutes.
The seat I chose was on the opposite side of the waiting room. It was early; I hadn’t had coffee, and I’m not one for small talk, particularly in a medical facility. The man and woman sat one seat apart, which made me assume they weren’t together.
The elderly man then broke the AM discomfort and said, “Boy, she sure does love music, but she can’t sing worth-a-lick!” referring to the hidden phlebotomist. The woman next to him laughed a little and made her own comment about the song being sung out of tune. Admittedly, the poor phlebotomist could not sing — it was awful.
As the three of us sat and listened to the a cappella psalms, the elderly woman said, “Music has really been my savior over the past few years.”
The man replied, “Oh, is that right? What type of music?”
“Well, I like all types of music. I like rock and roll, mostly from the 80s, and I even like a few rap songs. Sounds funny, but I’m originally from Inglewood.”
“I believe you, hun,” the man said. “It soothes the soul.”
“Hey, I don’t mean to be nosy, so forgive me, but do you go to Ascension?” the woman asked.
“I’ve been a member for forty-five years.”
“I thought I recognized you. I also attend Ascension, but not as long as you have.”
They laughed.
I assumed they were referring to the nearby Lutheran Christian congregation named after the Ascension of Jesus into heaven.
“What’s your name?” the man asked.
“Anita. And yours?”
“Carlsten.”
“Carlson?”
“No, Carlsten, with a t.”
“Oh, with a t. I got it, I got it,” Anita said.
I sat staring at the wall, trying not to look at my phone. I thought about a woman I once dated with oddly-shaped breasts. I recall her saying they looked like they didn’t like each other. An excellent description. Once, while vulnerable, she told me about how her mother referred to her as “Miss Piggy” while she was a child, and how much that hurt her feelings. Years later, it dawned on me that the nickname was not a reflection of her weight, but instead, her personality.
The singing phlebotomist came out of the office and announced that the blood drawing would soon begin.
”We’re open for business,” she said.
Carlsten said, “You sure like to sing, don’t ya? We just loved hearing your voice this morning — like a bird.”
“I sure do,” she replied.
She then walked over to the list, peeled off the top name, and said, “Carlsten? Are you here?”
“That’s me!”
“Do you have your lab orders?”
“Dr. Mendenhall already called them in.”
“I’ll have to check the system. What’s your date of birth?”
Carlsten replied, “10/1/1942.”
Anita then said, “You have to be joking with me — that’s also my birthday! We’re both October-one babies. You’re pulling my leg!”
“No legs being pulled here, Anita. What a coincidence! What a joy! But I bet you weren’t born in ‘42, though, were ya?”
“No, in ‘52. You got a few years on me.”
Only Anita laughed this time.
I noticed Carlsten’s ballcap, and it read “USS Newport News CA-148 - Vietnam Veteran.” The hat sat comfortably on his head, leaving room to not interfere with his large-rimmed glasses. He was wearing long, khaki shorts and Velcro-strapped shoes. His large, hard belly protruded out as he rested his crossed arms on it. You could easily bounce a coin off it.
Anita was wearing flip-flops, a blue muumuu, and a purse the size of an elephant’s head, which she rested on her knees. Anita’s ankles were swollen, and her varicose veins were exposed. I felt bad for her, and my heart momentarily sank, despite the time of day.
I then began wondering what rap songs got Anita through her health woes the past few years. Every rapper that came to mind was quickly dismissed.
Jay-Z or Lil Wayne? Nah, can’t be. Maybe 90s rap, like Tupac or Dre? Nope, I can’t picture it. Perhaps it was Latryx’s “The Bumpin’ Contraction (The Recalibration)?”
The phlebotomist was no longer singing while she looked up Carlsten’s lab orders.
The silence seemed awkward for Anita. She seemed fidgety and said, “I just can’t get over those poor Iskanders. The sadness will never subside.”
I knew exactly what she was referring to.
In September 2020, local Conejo Valley socialite Rebecca Grossman fatally struck and killed brothers Mark (11) and Jacob (8) Iskander in a crosswalk near her residence. The incident occurred while she was allegedly racing her then-boyfriend, Scott Erickson, a former Dodgers player, at high speed. She reportedly also had at least one and a half margaritas at a local Mexican restaurant I used to haunt. I once had brunch there with a top 10 hangover with the oddly-shaped-breasted woman. I ordered a Bloody Mary to cure the shakes, she ordered a water, gave me the stink-eye, and huffed under her breath.
Grossman was convicted in February 2024 on two counts of second-degree murder, gross vehicular manslaughter, and hit-and-run. As a result of her conviction, she was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison in June 2024.
Rebecca’s husband is Dr. Peter Grossman, a renowned Southern California plastic surgeon and the medical director of the Grossman Burn Center.
California Highway Patrol officers pulled Rebecca Grossman over several years earlier for speeding at 93 mph on the 101 Freeway and warned her that speeding is dangerous.
During the Iskander trial, the CHP officer testified that Grossman told him she hoped he didn’t need the services of the Grossman Burn Center.
Carlsten said, “She has never even apologized. Not publicly, anyway. I read that Karim and the family moved to Boston. Imagine being a family of six, losing your two youngest, uprooting across the country, and only being a family of four. Deep, deep sorrow.”
“Absolutely devastating,” Anita said.
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