My daily walks around my neighborhood are my greatest source of non-food related joy. My neighborhood is not particularly easy on the eyes (or ears, or nose), but what it lacks in aesthetics it makes up for in convenience. The Internet agrees, giving it a walk score of 91 and describing it as a “walker’s paradise.” The label is a tad hyperbolic.
Most of its sidewalks abut busy streets filled with drivers who speed as if they’re being chased, see red lights and stop signs as mere suggestions, and aim their cars at those crossing on foot as if they’ll get bonus points for hitting someone. When I think of a paradise for walkers, I imagine car-less streets lined with fresh coconut water stands, pop-up masseurs offering cheap foot massages, and clean public bathrooms (manned with an attendant offering tiny bottles of water, sunscreen, and baby wipes). But the online pedestrian barometer’s metric of utopia is linked to one’s ability to run everyday errands on foot. In that regard, my neighborhood’s high walk score is well deserved.
For example, it’s a short jaunt from my condo to the grounds of the local cemetery. It’s the nicest park in my neighborhood, by far. Envision a west coast version of New York City’s Central Park, but with one-quarter of its acreage and where the graves of the bodies buried there are marked. The park cemetery has 200 acres of sprawling trees, well-manicured lawns, and epitaphs for famous dead people. It’s an optimal location for a long leisurely stroll and gravestone watching. Etta James, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Charles and – one of the most influential American patriarchs of our time – Robert Kardashian, are just a few of the well-known bodies that were laid to rest a mere ten minutes away from my doorsteps!
I can also walk to not one but two libraries from my home. Typically, I choose to journey to the one furthest away, because it’s adjacent to a strip club. The billboard advertising the adult entertainment establishment proclaims it’s “L.A.’s Friendliest Gentlemen’s Club.” (Doesn’t that just lift your spirits?) I’ve yet to step inside, so I can’t confirm, but I imagine the sign is meant to lure in a clientele interested in a collegial environment. It’s presumably a place where you can eat, drink and enjoy the company of learned women, who’ll chat with you in various stages of undress, about your latest book haul.
Recently, I discovered I’m within walking distance of a Labcorp specimen collection site. I found this out one Friday afternoon last month, after having my poop rejected for the first time at a different Labcorp location several cities away hours earlier.
“SHEILA ON—”called the white coated lady from behind the glass-protected reception area of the far away Labcorp.
I raised my right hand, like an eager student on their first day of school in homeroom, announcing my attendance from the waiting area. After weeks of dragging my feet, I’d finally showed up to what I hoped was the final test in a tournament of exams my primary care physician had ordered. At the top of the year, I’d come down with a stomach virus that put me out for a week. To confirm it was just a passing illness, and not a deeper issue, my body had been put through a CT scan, transvaginal and transabdominal ultrasounds, numerous blood and urine tests, “does it hurt here?” probes, and a waste of an appointment with a gastroenterologist. I was now tasked with providing a “fecal specimen” for testing. My body was present and ready.
After double checking my insurance and ID cards, the white coated lady looked me over.
“Do you have it with you?” she whispered, moving her masked face closer to the opening of the glass.
“Nooooo?” I responded, unsure of why the white coated lady was speaking so low and in code.
The white coated lady excused herself into a room connected to the reception area and returned with what looked like a Bloomindale’s shopping bag, sans the “big brown bag” label. She motioned me over to the reception area’s door, where she explained its contents: a two-pocket Ziploc bag, with my lab order in one pocket and a tube and tiny wipe rag in another; and a beige plastic toilet seat receptacle.
“I can’t do this here?” I asked as she handed me my shit swag bag.
“Nooooo,” she whispered, shaking her head. “You’ll have to collect it at home and bring it back. But you won’t have to wait in line again.”
It was at this moment I began to suspect this white coated lady had me fucked all the way up.
First, it was clear she was treating fecal matter – my fecal matter – as being beneath the other types of bodily excretions she’s presumably trained in collecting and probing. I’ve provided both blood and urine samples on a prior occasion at that same facility. So why, pray tell, is poop an extra offense to the sensibilities of this health care laboratory? (I’m still considering sending management a terse email complaint with the subject line, “Unacceptable: Labcorp Tolerates Discrimination Against Poop.”)
Second, I came to this Labcorp facility by car. I try to consolidate all errands that require a car into one day of the week. Driving, dealing with traffic, finding parking, putting on clothes and fixing my face to be outdoors and around people siphons my energy and stalls my productivity. I didn’t want to push the poop test out for yet another week, so I was committed to getting this shit done that day.
Third, and speaking of shit, I needed to take one – expeditiously! I woke up that morning thinking, Today’s the day I’ll finally have my poop tested! So, I held my first morning’s excrement for the occasion. I hadn’t considered the possibility of a “you’ll need to do that shit at home” dismissal at my arrival.
Nor had I planned to collect a sample of my poop in a public bathroom stall inside a nearby Ralphs.
With my shit swag bag swinging in my right hand, I walked through the automatic doors of the grocery store and straight to the produce section. I checked out the price of fresh aloe vera leaves while tearing off plastic produce bags. Too expensive, I thought as I entered the hall under the “Restrooms” sign.
Inside the stall, I went over the white coated lady’s instructions in my head. First, poop (don’t pee) in the receptacle. Second, open the tube, and place the specimen inside, up to the line marked in red. Third, close the tube and write your name, date and time of collection on it clearly. My bowels had been waiting for my go signal for about 1.5 hours, so the first step was a cinch. It was the second step that proved to be the actual test.
The tube’s length and circumference matched that of my index finger. Standing over my poop in the plastic receptacle — inside that tiny ass stall — I wondered what evil ass lab tech association decided that you can collect your urine in a whole ass cup, but when it comes to collecting fecal specimens, you must figure out a way to piece your poop into a tiny ass test tube.
I placed the plastic produce bags over my hands, opened the tiny ass test tube and glided it through my poop. I pretended it was a sandworm in Dune, gobbling up spice pillaging Harkonnens on Arrakis. But that was a failure; not enough poop got inside the tube. Reminding myself that it wasn’t playtime, I forced myself to slow down and focus. Using my pinky, I fed small particles into the tube’s mouth and tapped its bottom on the toilet seat to get the poop to fall into the body of the tube. After I was able to get enough poop inside the tube, I capped it, cleaned up my toilet workstation, washed my hands and took my shit swag bag, with my Ziploc’d specimen, right back to Labcorp.
“No, I can’t take this,” whispered the white coated lady with the attitude of a judgy thrift store clerk at Buffalo Exchange.
“Why not?” I asked.
“The lab will reject it,” she said pointing to the rim of the cap. There was a bit of a smear I couldn’t clean off or remove without taking off the label. I thought the slip up was trivial, but the white coated lady glared at me like I was a raggedy-ass dirty bitch passing out samples of my poop smear for shits and giggles. “They don’t like it when there’s fecal matter outside the tube,” she clarified.
Bitch, I don’t either! I wanted to remind the white coated lady this was a fucking health care laboratory, and it was literally her job to take my shit. But I just took a deep breath.
“How exactly do I collect it without getting fecal matter outside the tube?” I asked, thinking there were some trade tricks she could share.
“Just be very careful,” she said in a tone that teetered on condescension. “And don’t forget to put your name, the date and time of collection on the tube,” she continued, handing me another shit swag bag.
I cursed out the white coated lady, and the entire Western health care industry, in my head on the ride home to a made-up tune: “This is why we don’t / fuck with y’all (fuck with y’all) / medical professionals.”
Google informed me there was a Labcorp specimen drop off center inside of a Walgreens under two miles from my condo. I decided, after my next bowel movement, I’d figure out how to successfully inject my poop into the test tube and deliver the specimen while completing the day’s walk.
It’s recommended to incorporate predetermined stops or resting points when taking long walks, particularly when it’s sunny outside. That day it was in the low- to mid-60s, but the southern California sky was cloudless and the sun bright. I decided on two stops.
My first stop was at a Mexican grocery store. It’s a part of a local chain where the security guard greets you with a smile, the guys that work in the produce section help you find the ripest fruits, and the prices are affordable. For instance, for $0.25 you can step on a scale and get a printout of your weight, the day’s lucky lottery numbers, and an inspirational message from The Virgin Mary. Fresh aloe vera leaves are two-thirds of the price of those at Ralphs. Also, five dollars will get you a sixteen-ounce bottle of fresh squeezed fruit juice.
“I like to mix this with papaya,” said the cashier, in a heavy Mexican accent, as she scanned my bottle of fresh carrot and orange juice. She shared her favorite post-work juice recipes before asking me how I use the aloe vera leaf.
“I rub it on my face in the mornings,” I told her. “I use it like a cleanser,” I continued, sharing with her a few of my favorite topical concoctions.
“Oh — you have lipstick,” she said showing me her teeth and pretending to rub her forefinger across them vigorously. This prompted me to rub my teeth against the inside of my black sweatshirt and study my reflection in my phone’s camera. If she hadn’t brought it to my attention, I’d have delivered my poop with a smile stained the color of Sienna Rose. I don’t know if facilities share (or take) notes, but I didn’t want to chance being labeled as raggedy at a second Labcorp location.
I live a short walk away from three stadiums. One of which is a sports and entertainment indoor-outdoor stadium that’s a part of a largely vacant, open-air mixed-use complex, boasting upscale retailers, luxury town homes and flats, and parks and trails. It’s a fancy – and still in progress – development promising a big future for people who don’t yet live there. In its center is a large, manufactured body of water referred to as Rivers Lake. I decided to take my second break there.
As I sipped on my carrot-orange juice and stared at the calm waters, I wondered how many more peoples’ bodies will be pulled out of it and have their deaths labelled as accidental drownings. The most recent body was pulled out two months ago. There’s no official name for the body of water. They’ll likely play it safe and name it after some professional footballer. I think it’d be more appropriate to name Rivers Lake after the lives it has claimed and include a stone memorial with the inscription: “In commemoration of the first of many bodies to be pulled from hereunder.” Lest these new mutherfukers forget, this is a city where bodies, and the people they belong to, still matter.
Dropping off my poop at Walgreens was uneventful. Collecting my poop specimen for the second time that day was anything but. The short of it: in the comfort of my condo’s guest bathroom, while wearing vinyl gloves and utilizing Saran premium plastic wrap and a homemade piping bag for my poop (which I fashioned out of yet another plastic produce bag and Ziploc bag), I was able to squeeze in the perfect amount of poop without getting any outside the tube.
I walked my poop 1.7 miles to Walgreens, carrying it inside my Herschel Mini Nova denim backpack along with two cold gel packs, my Burt’s Bees Tinted Lip Balm, wallet, house keys, cell phone, and headphones. As soon as I reached the Labcorp kiosk at the back of Walgreens and noticed lines of people waiting between rows of vitamins, cold and flu medicine, and condoms, I proudly announced to the lab tech on check-in duty, “I have a specimen to drop off!”
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Your lab test results are ready.
Two days later I received an email from Labcorp. I logged-in to my account and pulled up the appropriate PDF. My eyes darted to the word “Negative.” The relief I felt dissipated when I continued to read: Test not performed. Specimen not received at refrigerated temperature. My head fell forward, heavy with shame.
Lapcorp rejected my poop for the second time.
There’s a fourth step in the Labcorp fecal specimen collection directive I failed to mention above: Keep the specimen in the fridge before returning it the next day. To be fair, the white coated lady noted this conditional caveat; however, I decided it was irrelevant to me, as I wasn’t interested in handling any next day shit. As much as I am a fan of poop, my fridge is not. I assumed I could save my fridge the dishonor by returning my specimen the same day I collected it. I was wrong – the persnickety fuckers at Labcorp can only handle chilled poop.
There’s a voicemail, left by my PCP’s office, I’ve yet to return. I’m not yet ready to confront my failure to deliver; or to try for a third time to prove to Labcorp that my poop is good enough. I also haven’t found the words to break it to my fridge that it’ll have to host a tube of my poop overnight. I know things will never be the same between us.
Next week, the weather’s going to be in the high 60s. My PCP’s office is an 11-minute walk from my home, and a few store fronts away from where I purchase my weekly matcha latte. Wearing my best walking outfit, and with my milky-green drink in hand, I plan to go there and negotiate another poop collection option that’s better suited to my skillset and idiosyncrasies. Fingers crossed; I need a win.