I’m in the doctor’s office, waiting as patiently as, well, a patient, looking at all the medically things in the cabinets. Just checking stuff out, opening drawers, stealing pens and giant Q-tips, misbalancing the scale, when I finally assess the paper drapes the nurse said I had to wear after I nakify myself.     

I can figure out the lap one but there’s another one with a hole for my head in it. The nurse told me to wear it like a pancho. I don’t wear panchos. Never worn a pancho in my life and I’m pretty sure I haven’t been to the Andes recently.     

So, I’m sitting there, naked now, trying to figure out which side goes in front. I have it kind of long over my shoulders but it doesn’t really cover anything coverable. My lap is covered. So are my….shoulders. Long on the sides, short in the front. Really short. For the life of me, I can’t understand why my shoulders are something that would need to be covered while everything else is, well, out there. Are they concerned about me being cold? –and I’m obviously cold–because if they were, they wouldn’t leave me in a freezing office with just a paper pancho to call my own.

Is this by design? I’m just confused, imagining bathing suits, dress suits, evening wear designed by the couture. Maybe in Europe. Probably in Europe. In fact, I’m wondering if there’s a new enterprise in my future, a fashion genius hiding behind all this goofiness.

It’s the commotion in the hallway that takes me out of my reverie. I catch my reflection in the mirror that reveals to me how incredibly wrong I was about how to wear a pancho. Believe it or not, it’s the LONG part that goes in front.  

The nurse walks in just as I’m turning my paper pancho around.   She smiles.

I’m inordinately relieved.   “Ready!”