Throwback Thursday – from August 2015

The Mormon Tabernacle Bomb Scare

WHEN I WENT TO SEE MY DOCTOR yesterday I expected to do most of the talking.

“This feels good, that doesn’t feel good, I’m taking my meds and we’ve been on vacation.”

“I’ve been there.”

This time my Doctor surprised me by opening up and telling me a bit about himself.

He is a native of India (I figured that out all by myself) and when he was a student he travelled extensively in the U.S. by bus. He gave me a hot travel tip (forty years out of date) that Greyhound Bus sold passes for $99 that were good for unlimited travel for 99 days.

Who in their right mind would want to spend 99 days on a Greyhound bus? Obviously, the answer is the man who is now in charge of keeping me alive.

When I did not express shock, disgust or fear and did not bolt from the room, he continued with his travelogue.

Back in the days of his youth, the 1970s is my guess; his ninety-nine dollars took him to Salt Lake City (I’ve been there). He wanted to attend a performance of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and to hear their magnificent pipe organ in concert. That’s about it in Salt Lake City – unless you want to walk around town stepping over the outstretched legions of “Urban Nomadic Sommeliers.”

He continued.

“No matter where I went I always carried my small suitcase with me that had all of my clothes and ‘essentials.’ I carried it when I went to hear the choir.”

When he gave me that detail I was lost as to where this was going. He soon filled in the blanks for me.

“As I sat there, waiting for the concert to begin, it got very quiet in the hall. Some people near me began to talk, saying that they could hear something ‘ticking’ and they were afraid that it was a bomb.

“Shortly, an announcement was made that the hall was to be evacuated because of a bomb threat. When I tried to leave I was surrounded by fifteen policemen. They escorted (his word, not mine) me into a room and asked me if I had a bomb in my suitcase. I told them that it was just my alarm clock that was ticking. I had no bomb.

“When I tried to open my suitcase to show them they became agitated and would not let me.”

At this point in his narrative I was laughing – he was not.

Of course, they found only the Good Doctor – To – Be’s Indian-made alarm clock ticking away loudly.

“After they returned my alarm clock I thanked them for the ‘VIP Treatment’ they had given me.”

That was his attempt at wry humor.

“I never did get to hear the choir. They wouldn’t let me back into the hall.”

Life is like that, Doctor.

After all of that my blood pressure was fine, my heart was still beating and he gave me the go-ahead to stay alive for another three months.

As I was leaving I gave him a new adage to think about:

“Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose and sometimes you get the ‘VIP Treatment,’ but they still won’t let you back in.”