A new president means time for my physical

Some people have annual physical checkups, some have semi-annual, and some more frequently.

In my case, I just had my semi-decade physical.

If it were up to me, there would be no debate over health care reform in this country. The only debate would be over what second job doctors could find to supplement their income and what to do with all those big, empty medical buildings and hospitals — warehouses, maybe, or offices or condominiums.

I have been blessed with good health, at least to this point in my life — and that sound you’re hearing right now is me rapping on the side of my head, knocking on wood for continued good luck.

I’m not saying I haven’t had a few knocks, bruises, sneezes or sniffles over the years, but nothing at all major or incapacitating.

I’ve spent lots more time — and far more nights — in hospitals with my daughter, my wife, my parents, my in-laws and even a few strangers than I have myself.

It’s hard to figure out how I’ve managed to stay on the good side of health thus far, given my less-thanperfect diet at times and my lack of exercise or physical activity for the most part, but whatever it’s been, I hope it continues.

One concession I have made is to step up the frequency of my checkups, to where this one followed my last checkup by only five years or so.

They were further apart when I was much younger. I had to take a physical when I left for college, but then it was another 20 years or so before I bothered with another one.

When I went in for that physical and the doctor asked me when my last physical had been, I answered, “during the Nixon administration.”

She apparently found that amusing and when I saw her again a few years later, I looked at my chart on her desk and saw that she had written in her notes, “Patient’s last physical during Nixon administration.” Apparently, there was no medical abbreviation or Latin phrase for that.

This time, once again, I was able to say that the last time I’d had a physical was during a Republican presidential administration, but at least this time there were no other presidential administrations, Republican or Democratic, in the interim.

I’m not completely without medical conditions. For instance, I have von Willebrand disease, a bleeding disorder.

It usually hasn’t been a major problem for me, although I did spend the night of the 1989 San Francisco earthquake in the hospital after a joint bleed caused my knee to swell up. It did give me something to help me remember where I was when that historic event happened.

And at my last physical, I discovered that I had acquired an ulcer over the years. The old saying goes that success has many fathers while failure is an orphan, but it’s also true that an ulcer has many fathers — and mothers.

For mine, I can blame several past bosses, several children — of mine — and plenty of other people as well.

This time around, the doctor didn’t discover anything new, fortunately.

At least I didn’t have to reintroduce myself to the doctor when I went in for my physical, but that’s only because we both go to the same church and see each other there regularly. Otherwise, he probably wouldn’t even know me at all.

Somehow — don’t ask me how, it wasn’t from trying on my part — I had lost five pounds from the last time I’d seen him. Maybe they need to replace their scale.

I also somehow lost an inch, it seems. No wonder I go in for a physical so rarely — if I’d been going for one every year, at this rate I’d be shorter than a Munchkin.

Other than the lost pounds and inch, everything went all right at this physical. When I left, the doctor told me to keep doing whatever I was doing and stay healthy.

And I told him I’d probably see him again after the next change of presidential administrations, whenever that might be.