A Travel Junkie's Diary

by Dina Bennett

  At this moment, though, I don’t much care where Bernard stands, as long as the upcoming procedure is over as quickly and painlessly as possible. It’s cocktail hour in Pucón, one of Chile’s magnificent lake resorts, and what I want more than anything is a nicely chilled and shaken pisco sour.

  It’s testimony to the positive aura of our Anti-Rally road trip through Patagonia, that even when things start to go bad they’re still good. It was two days ago that we decided to stop in Talca, which borders Reserva Nacional Altos de Lircay (also called Protected Area Vilches), one of Chile’s many national parks. The Sendero de Chile winds through Vilches, which means I can hike up high and see the snowcapped peaks of the Andes for myself, not from a plane window. To me these peaks are mythic, as they were the place my father went with his best friend and mountaineering partner when I was eight years old.

  At the time it seemed he’d disappeared, and I missed him in the egocentric way of a child, his absence disrupting my world while not spurring me to investigate where he was. Squeezing the red wax rind of gouda cheese into doll-sized dice and marking the numbers with an after-dinner toothpick was not as much fun if I couldn’t watch his elegant engineer’s fingers shaping the wax, or compare my clumsy dumplings to his precise cubes. We lived in a lovely, leafy suburb of New York City, and I missed bike riding with him and my visit to the tiny farm of Mr. Buccharelli, an Italian immigrant, where I played with wild kittens and picked heavy purple fruit from the immigrant fig tree. The half-built houses we explored on neighborhood rambles, standing in each room to guess how it would be used, were fast getting finished without my father to help me muse about what they’d become.

  What seemed a lifetime later he returned, happy and sunburned, and we resumed our father–daughter explorations. Though my father continued to travel to wild places throughout my adulthood, trips we talked about sometimes at length, somehow I never thought to ask him about the Andes. So it is that since the 1960s the Andes have a held a large yet vague status in my mind, remaining a place of intrigue, a place I knew about, that was part of my being, yet knew nothing of. By the time he returned to the southern Andes in the late 1990s, specifically for the peaks of Torres del Paine and Fitz Roy, I was old enough to be enraptured by his photographs and to listen attentively to his tales. Finally, myth melded with memory and I knew I had to see for myself the places of which he spoke.

  This is why, on waking up in Talca, I’m beyond excited, but I’m also a bag of jitters. Making a pronouncement on the significance of seeing the Andes that has no rationale beyond “I want to,” I’ve convinced Bernard that we need to do this hike, need to glimpse the real Andes, and that I’m physically able to do it despite severe tendinitis in each ankle and a ruptured ACL in my right knee. The tendinitis, a lingering (okay, chronic) malady that took possession of my Achilles tendons on the P2P, prevents me from walking normally uphill. The ACL injury, a result of an unfortunate ski fall two weeks before our departure, makes walking on anything but smooth, level ground an exercise in diligent attention to tiny, tripping obstacles. That morning, my only deference to my injuries has been to pull on an awkward neoprene knee brace. It makes my knee sweat and I hate its interfering ways the moment I cinch it into place, but Bernard will not tolerate my going without.

  Once onto the rubbly, steep trail, I have to walk several miles uphill, which I do on tiptoes to keep from aggravating my squeaky inflamed tendons. Hampered by my precarious mincing step, I struggle to avoid twisting my knee on the uneven terrain. For this I should rely on the brace. But I have no faith in it, so I just clench the knee joint and don’t bend it. Once I get high enough to actually see the far peaks, I tell Bernard I’ve gone as far as I can. It’s not the end of the trail, but I’m not disappointed. To the contrary, it’s unexpectedly emotional to be there, a generalized feeling of accomplishment coupled with relief that leaves me both exhilarated and drained. Though I advance like a stump-legged pirate on the way down, I complete the long, hot hike without whining. That alone is bracing in a way the knee contraption hasn’t been, and it’s helped along by the icy Coke I gulp down at a roadside stand when we finally reach our car.

  On the drive back, with nothing to distract me but daydreams of the puddle-sized pool at our guesthouse, I notice there’s a tiny drummer in my foot, a mild but persistent percussion emanating from my big toe. My toes don’t normally emit insistent rhythmic clamors for attention. As a rule I would normally bring up the throbbing beat, but as it happens I’m trying on a new me, an I-don’t-always-have-to-complain persona which I’m finding quite refreshing. I say nothing.

  When my left foot emerges from its sweaty sock cocoon back in our room, the nail on my big toe is revealed in all its bluish-purple glory. I know what this portends but choose to ignore it, making up a fantasy for myself about how this nail color is just temporary, something that’ll subside on its own by the next morning. I peel off the offending knee brace, wriggle into my bathing suit and head out to the pool. As soon as I step in, the warm water acts like a stage amp at a Madonna concert, with my toe the electric bass belting out a throb so insistent in its pulse that I feel sure everyone can hear the beat. I prop my leg up on an extra chair, avoiding Bernard’s inquiring gaze.

  That night, the sheet is like a lead slab whose full weight is pressing on what’s ordinarily a modest piece of body real estate. The next day, a driving day, I do my navigating with foot propped on dash board, hoping gravity will drain the pooling blood away from the toe. I have plenty more out-of-car excursions in mind for us through Patagonia that involve having ten good toes on my feet. It is unacceptable that one out of ten would become such a showstopper.

  Things don’t improve once we reach our Pucón hotel, though that’s not the fault of the hotel, a strikingly modern Frank Lloyd Wright imitation whose gardens of magenta and orange bougainvillea slope down to the electric blue waters of Lago Villarica. Not only is there a steam-powered boat chugging along the shore, there’s an immense white-capped volcano on the near horizon. It’s so Shangri-la that we decide to stay for a couple of days. On a short exploration around the grounds, I inadvertently bump my toe. It’s a light tap, really nothing more than a grazing of the stair step, but it sends me cursing and hopping about like a demented chicken. I go to dinner in sandals into which I slide my foot at the slow careful pace of the spider inching along our windowsill. Regardless, even the caress of limpid warm lakeside air is too much. The continuous pounding in my toe accompanies dinner like a morbid tango.

  To say I awake the next morning would be to imply I actually slept. It takes only a cursory glance to confirm that the offending nail is now trying to levitate off the nail bed. “Bernard,” I gulp, scared to reveal the obvious, thinking to do so is only going to make it worse. “It’s not getting better.” I am so forlorn about having to forfeit all my boot-related activities that I’m nearly in tears when I add, “I think a doctor needs to look at it.”

  Up until now, Bernard’s been willing to buy into my stoicism. Hearing the catch in my voice, he realizes the new, improved me has gone as far as she can. Action is needed. He leaps to my suitcase in search of the blue medical kit, in which surely there’ll be something to fix me. Cradling it like a fragile baby he starts plying me with questions in a hopeful tone. “Dina, there’s a pill that can help you, no?” I shake my head. Next, he tries a smidge of empathy, “Pauvre cherie, tell me which medication you want and I will get it for you.” I shake my head harder. With rising uncertainty whether he’ll be able to do anything for me at all he starts to panic, issuing rapid fire options: “A painkiller? Anti-inflammatory? Compress? Something else?” The more he’s wrong the more irritated I get until finally I shake my head in annoyance and mutter, “Noooo. Nothing! I want a doctor!”

  From there, things move into fast-forward. Yes, the front desk knows a doctor who will make hotel calls. Yes, they’ll phone him to come in. Yes, he will respond to the call even though it’s Valentine’s Day and he’s taken the day off to
spend it with his wife down at the shore. Within an hour the doctor has arrived, a dark-haired, handsome man in his late thirties. He enters the lobby with a swagger, oozing charisma, his eyes flashing a come-hither look that surely wants to see more than my big toe. Or so I imagine.

  Back in the room, I lay on the bed. Bernard sits on a chair. The doctor hovers close enough that I can marvel enviously at his long black lashes and inhale his musky scent of solicitous machismo. When he turns his eyes on me, deep-set and dark as espresso, I feel like swooning. But I’m no Scarlett O’Hara in crinoline. I have no glossy curls and large plantation to offer, only the ugliness of my big toe. I wave my foot, then work at calming my fluttering heart. “Yes,” the doctor tells me, after inspecting the toe. “The toenail is a problem.” I’m relieved he thinks so, as I don’t have the Spanish vocabulary for “This son-of-a-bitch is killing me.” And anyway, his Spanish-flavored English and mellifluous tone calm me like a valium downed with vodka. I want him to keep speaking, to say anything at all, just so I can listen to his voice and not have to think about the implications of what he’s saying.

  “So. I can offer you two options,” he continues, professional words tinged with vowels of sympathy. “It is okay for you to stay as you are. In a few weeks, the nail will come off on its own. So you don’t have to do anything today if you do not want to. Of course, it will be very painful that whole time. And it can easily get infected.” Well, this I already know. I was hoping he’d have something more inspiring to offer. “Or,” and here he pauses like a good game show host, letting the tension build, “I can take the toenail off right now.”

  “What? You mean here?”

  “No,” he says with a laugh. “Oh, no, no, no, no. I will take you to my hospital and we will do it there.”

  This doctor owns a hospital? And where might that be? Detecting I’m perplexed, he says, “It’s just five minutes from here. I will drive you there myself.”

  “And if I have the nail removed, then what?”

  “In a few days you will be able to wear shoes, no problem.”

  I like the sound of that. Besides, the math is evident: three weeks without shoes versus three days without shoes. It’s a no-brainer and I don’t waste a second considering the hospital I’m about to visit nor what it’ll be like to have a large toenail taken off before its time. I do not ordinarily seek out hospitals at home. I don’t like their smell, their sense of uneasy mystery nor what they portend in terms of pain and illness. So it’s a surprise even to me that I’m quite peppy at the thought of what I’m about to see. The toe calamity has become my ticket to a great adventure which I will be the only traveler to experience, namely, an insider’s tour of a Chilean hospital, in a state alert enough to appreciate it.

  Unlike hermetically sealed American hospitals, the one in Pucón is a low, airy affair. It’s run by Catholic nuns who skim along the hallways in floor-whisking robes. As we walk in, a few waft by in their efficient, prayerful way, bestowing on me a smile filled with kindness and silent blessings. An affable breeze moves gently through open windows, bringing in the perfume of flower beds and trimmed lawns. It rustles papers at the intake desk and flirts with the hems of the nuns’ white habits. “My charge nurse,” the doctor says, grabbing one of the passing nuns by the elbow. He whispers conspiratorially to her, then slips away so discreetly I wonder whether he’s decided to abnegate on his surgical responsibilities. “He goes to change,” she tells us. “Into sterile garments, and his doctor coat.” I hadn’t thought about that. What a relief that he has one of those white jackets with his name embroidered on it. It’s proof either he is what he says he is or a fabulously clever priest. Now she takes me by my elbow. “Please, follow me,” and she ushers me down a short hallway into the operating room.

  Waiting for the doctor to reappear, I make myself comfortable on the gurney, which is so high I need a stepping stool to mount up. Lolling fully and happily conscious I inspect the surgical arena. It looks like a kitchen, except the glass-fronted cabinets hold surgical supplies instead of dishes. The chevron pattern of the white-on-white floor tiles gleams from an intensity of scrubbing that I’m aware exists in this world but have never witnessed until now. Lace curtains framing tall windows are straight out of Masterpiece Theatre. Perhaps if I stay long enough, someone will arrive with a tray of crumpets and tea.

  The doctor bustles in, bends his handsome head to his nurse for a brief sotto voce conference, then turns to us and says, “There’s been a bad car accident. The victims are being brought here.” The sort of sulk that clouded my not-very-sunny disposition when I was a child now threatens to emerge. I can see that my toenail no longer holds much interest. No more chatting, no more commiseration, no more suave stroking of my ankle. I have been reduced to nothing more than a purple keratin impediment to the messily intriguing surgeries currently being ambulanced over.

  “Okay, let’s begin,” he says, with a snap of sterile latex gloves that the nurse has obligingly held open for him to wriggle onto his hands. “We will shortly need to use this room again.” He nods to the nurse, who rips open sterile packets as if they were cookie wrappers, laying glistening surgical implements and a small mountain of gauze onto a tray. There seem to be more of these items than a simple toe procedure would warrant. I lie back and stare at the ceiling, invoking the two lessons in biofeedback I took during my freshman year in college. Breathe. Clear your mind. I breathe. My mind does not clear.

  Bernard squeezes my hand as the doctor injects Lidocaine around the tip of my toe to numb it. “Hey! Yow!!” I chide him, in the universal language of outrage. There is pain involved in this procedure after all, and although it lasts only a few seconds it seriously disrupts my barely functioning biofeedback skills. Pinching, or for all I know stabbing, my now numb toe, the doctor asks me if I can feel anything. I’ve never really trusted anesthetics, and now that breathing and mind-clearing are no longer working, I’m uneasy. “A little,” I choke out, to buy more time. Bernard seems to sense that I’m stalling and, not wanting to miss a slash, he drops my hand and sidles to the foot of the gurney, where he and the doctor discuss the merits and strategies of various nail removal tools. I refrain from shouting, “Hey, I see you down there instead of up here. I’m not knocked out by anesthesia you know.” My fingers, left to dangle, start fretting.

  “Would you like to watch your matrixectomy?” the doctor asks me.

  Matrix-what? My final shred of desire for new experiences expires on the operating room floor. “Actually, I’m finding endless amusement in staring at the ceiling. So, thank you, no.” I wait for him to warn me he’s ready to start, imagining the searing burn of ripped skin parting from tightly bound nail if he begins before the Lidocaine has worked its magic.

  “It’s done,” he says, forceps held high, clamping the equivalent of a piece of uncooked macaroni for me to look at.

  “Really?” I prop myself on my elbows to assess my foot. If you’ve never seen one, a nail bed is nowhere near as pretty to look at as a toenail. And this one, having received the pounding of its life, looks like an inch-square cube steak. The nail, which had loomed so large over my life, now lies curled, pale, and innocuous, on the tray.

  But this is no time to tarry on a hospital gurney, dreaming of hikes that might have been. My toenail has been unceremoniously dumped in the trash and the nurse is flapping new sheets at me, shooing me off as if I were a bee on an anaphylactic arm, eager to prep the room for the enticingly injured victims to come. More importantly, it’s Valentine’s Day, and awaiting us at the hotel is a six-course dinner. For this elegant soiree, however, I must resign myself to reality: the allure of my outfit will not be complemented by my bloody bandaged toe.

  Despite my fashion crisis, I have to give my toe credit. It immediately proves its value when it scores us a front-row table from which to watch the evening’s tango entertainment. Face filled with concern, perhaps more for the distaste of the other guests than my toe swaddled in its bulging white cartoon b
andage, the maître d’ presents me with a stool upon which to rest my foot, then discreetly thrusts it, along with my leg, under our pink tablecloth. Happily settled for the evening, I let my mind turn to the future—like what I’ll do the next time I want a pedicure. I can only hope they’ll give me a discount for painting nine nails instead of ten.

  Shoulders

  MYSORE, INDIA, 2009

  Mysore sounds like a word that has special meaning for me: masseur. Within a few days of starting any road trip, I feel like I have been crammed into the clothes dryer and pummeled. When my mind isn’t occupied with where we are and where we need to go, I am thinking about massages, in particular how much I need one and whether I can get one at our next hotel. Though we do strive mightily to reach somewhere with a hotel each night, not often is it a place where a massage would be offered, let alone a place where I’d indulge such a hands-on experience if it were. After all, a bad massage can be even more distressing than no massage at all. For me, there’s a pure and objective measure of whether it’s time to prostrate myself on the table: can I turn my entire torso rearward when Bernard asks me to guide him into a tight parking spot.

  I’m no stranger to the massage table. At home, I have cultivated a relationship with a massage therapist who applies ancient Japanese arts in nigh miraculous ways, practicing what I consider the body equivalent of shuttle diplomacy. After an hour and a half on her table, the war zone that was my sore back, stressed-out nerves, and glued fascia once again agree to friendly terms of coexistence.

  Sadly, she is now thousands of miles away, leaving me with only two options: live with my discomfort knowing it will get worse, or put myself in the hands of a stranger knowing there’s a good probability I’ll still get worse, but also a possibility I could get better. I remember one of our drives through India. A week in and we enter the mid-continent city of Mysore, pulling into the security-guarded portico of a hotel that yesterday’s research confirms has a spa. I am so uncomfortable my lips are downturned, eyes ringed with dark circles, my face in general pinched with despair. Dumping my suitcase in our room and bidding a cursory adieu to Bernard, I head for the promised land.