Wine, Pneumonia and Death

I have a friend who's got walking pneumonia. In itself this wouldn't be a big woopty-doo except that this is the second time she's had it in the last couple of months. Funny thing is, she's usually pretty faithful to go and get checked up and follow doctor's orders and whatnot. This time she's in bed after promising the doctors that she would stay there until she got better. She ignored them the first time, it seems she's ignoring them again this time, so I'm thinking pretty soon she'll be at death's door with a cigarette in one hand and a glass on wine in the other wondering where she went wrong.

This got me thinking, how many people do you know who are not only health concious, but that get regular check ups and follow what the doctor says? In general, almost everyone I know is a cheater when it comes to that, myself included. I don't know if it was my parent's hippie lifestyle and belief in all things natural and spiritual to heal, or their aversion to doctors that has given me an indifferent attitude when it comes to health issues.

I'm not saying that I don't make my kids get checked and that I ignore serious symptoms, but the truth is that my family is pretty healthy - fingers crossed, knock on wood, and all that. As time goes by we're supposed to become more and more strict about health care and doctors and vitamins and whatnot, but really, who has the time for all of that?

Time or no, I know I've got to make some changes, see a couple of doctors, run a couple of tests and get things in order. I don't want to wait until I'm knocking on Heaven's door to finally go and get checked up (which was my original plan, actually).

I guess if nothing else my friend's irresponsibility and complete disregard for the precious gift of life has made me see that that's not the road I want to take. Riding shotgun with the Grim Reaper has never been my idea of fun. And while all the "doctor" rubbish doesn't sound like a capital idea to me, I'll play along and make nice so that when I finally see that light that shines so brightly but doesn't hurt my eyes, I can say with all certainty that it's not because I failed to see the doctor.

I leave you with a funny doctor/patient scene from Princess Bride where Billy Crystal works his creepy magic on Cary Elwes to revive him from the dead. I know it has little or nothing to do with this post, but there's a sort of doctor there, and there is some work done, so...