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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Drama / Human Interest
- Subject: Character Based
- Published: 05/28/2019
Discretion
Born 1949, M, from Kashmir, IndiaDISCRETION ….?
Zirsha
…..anyway, I approached the Eye specialist (Opthalmologist) and narrated him my pathetic tale of (my) head aching and told him about the advice given to me by a compounder for consulting some reputed Eye specialist to get rid of this headache which at times makes me feel like my head is pounding!
“Oh God, this time too I have a white wat on my brain!” I cried, though not so loudly.
The doctor subscribed the advice of compounder and nodded his head saying, “You’ve come to the right place. The cause of your headache seems definite due to bad vision. It is obviously because of eye strain which results in headache”.
The doctor checked my eyes for a few minutes and then heaping a deep sigh said, “Gentleman, you suffer from neovascularization”.
“O’ God..! What is that?” I lost my nerve!
I became so worried to hear such a long name of my trouble. Next, his deep sigh amplified my apprehensions. I guessed my days are numbered so my heart began to throb so loudly that the doctor wondered as to what were those sounds emerged in his room, and then detecting nothing asked me, “Gentleman, I suppose you carry a pocket watch with you, and your alarm is sounding?”
I didn’t tell the doctor what actually was 'sounding' there but inquired from him, “Sir, what is this neovascularization?”
“This is actually the growth of new, small blood vessels. In the retina, this may lead to loss of vision or blindness if not treated immediately”, he replied.
That information turned me more nervous. Both my temples accelerated their tinkling inside. Praise God, heartbeats began to subside.
Finally, my eye exam started. It was as if I was the student of the first primary and the teacher was examining my alphabet.
The doctor asked me to read the letters of a chart and kept me standing almost 20 feet away from that.
While conducting the eye exam, it became known to me that the poor Entomologist himself suffered from chronic visional defect, so when I read ‘B’ correctly he countered it was ‘D’. The same problem came up while I read ‘C’ because that appeared ‘O’ to the Doctor. As a consequence, reading that chart stretched to a squabble between the doctor and me. The noise began to erupt which forced the assistant of the doctor to come repeatedly in the room. He on every time supported the wrong ‘visional conclusions’ of the doctor because the poor fellow was for obvious reasons helpless to do otherwise!!
I guessed, in this setup of democracy make-believing system, the ‘wrong reader’ has the support of two votes while me just ‘one’, of myself, so I thought insisting to be on the right one may land me in some trouble, perhaps to be framed for having links with "Terrorists Organisations", because of not favouring the ‘democratic judgment’?
I knew it very well that in a democratic make-believe setup people are counted not weighed, worked out but not evaluated! Democracy for me means a condition in which numbers control a nation, not the wise! Democracy for me is a rule of vested interests over reason! The fickle crowd has a cost but reliable opinion no value!
So the ‘testing battle’ accomplished and I was relieved from that agonizing ‘interrogation’!! The doctor prescribed eyeglasses! But there were other troubles for me in destiny. A newer crisis appeared in a newer form. The Entomologist had put out his own shop for selling frames of specs. The salesman of the shop forcibly took my optical prescription and informed me that the lens and the frame had to be necessarily purchased by that shop. Rejecting my contention that I had paid the consultation fee of the doctor so it was my prerogative to buy the lens and frame from any place I wished, the ‘frame dealer’ remarked sarcastically, “don't you see how our graveyards got filled with the very similar type of aspirers and claimants that the dead are now buried on pathways? You must know that the discretion lies with the man who possesses the PRESCRIPTION”, he laughed loudly.
I thought if I kept mum upon every condition and constraint of that democracy then the people will not hesitate to snatch my pants even?
I decided that at least I should act like Palestinians against 'Israeli aggression' otherwise my silence will be construed to cowardice. So there was a bloody battle between them and me. I was alone on my front while they were three, as a doctor too participated in the scuffle. We freely exchanged blows and kicks on each other. It was like freestyle wrestling!!
Anyway, in spite of that catch-as-catch-can wrestling and throw and pin each other to the mat somersaults, I confess I could not win the ‘battle of Prescription’ and the Prescription remained very much in their possession!
Physically I was hurt more but financially they lost much because a bulk quantity of specs frames and door glasses and window panes got smashed during the brawl.
In order to prevent myself from financial crises, I did not lodge any report in the police! So after receiving first aid and bandaged from a local dispensary, I went to my home. Since I live alone there was none to inquire from me as to what was the matter and why was I ‘tattooed’ with multiple bruises?
After taking a rest for a couple of days at home I approached another entomologist for my trouble.
After going again through the eyesight examining test I discovered another entomologist too had his specs shop and patients were being forced to buy their prescribed specs from that shop. That discovery forced me to brief the doctor about the 'boxing event' which took place between the first entomologist plus his team and me. I thought it in the interests of 'law and order' also to voluntarily offer a dramatic presentation of that event to the entomologist with some horrible scenes in order to avoid a second brawl.
Unnerved and worried, the doctor suspected his rival entomologist would have planned a proxy war in his clinic. He imagined the massive damages in case his clinic turned to a battlefield. He was visibly terrified.
The prescription was handed over to me by the assistant of the doctor who was persistently trembling from the moment he came to know about my 'wrestling skills'.
Then the doctor observed a voluntary shutdown of his shop and clinic and scheduled a meeting at his home for reviewing and revoking his decision to bind his patients for buying the specs from his shop!!!
(Excerpts from a write-up which includes in my Urdu publication "Chodvi Ka Chand" (my 14th publication). Translated into English by me)
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