A Brush With Melanie the Mole

I'm going to start this one with a conclusion: I've come to realize that all of my tales on this blog revolve around some sort of embarrassing or compromising situation I've found myself in. And would you believe it keeps happening? This tale like an earlier incident involves nudity, which in my case always means embarrassment.

Before I dive into this incident, I'm required to give a brief history of how I came to such a situation. A situation unto itself is just a glorified water cooler discussion, however a situation with a history, well, that's a tale.

Our tale begins in the sensational Summer of 2009. It was such a great Summer for various reasons but the main ones being that it was my first Summer not spent in college, I had no job but I had money, and finally I had access to the Lake Lewisville tie-ups every weekend. As an independent 23 year old with no responsibility I found my self tied-up on the lake for weekends at a time. Mind y0u that this is lake is in Texas, during Summer. For those of you who have never seen me, I'm a red headed, pale skinned, Sun-fearing ginger (redundant?) that has no business lounging himself in open daylight for extended weekends. To be honest I could've been an extra on the horrid Twilight movies with no make-up necessary. Needless to say, my Summer was awesome and completely irresponsible as I made a few mistakes during my time out there. The entirety of those unfortunate oversights I will not digress to at this time but one consequence seemed to make itself apparent in a very alarming manner.
I know my body pretty well, I've been in possession of it my whole life and we've grown quite close. So when something new shows up, I notice it. For instance, at the end of the Summer of 2009 I notice a peculiar new mole that had never been where it was before. How, you say, did I know it was a new mole? Well it's in a private location, just above what 50 Cent refers to as the "Magic Stick". I don't know calculus or a single Canadian Prime Minister (who does?) but I know that area better than anything. Let me put it this way: I use my knowledge of that area as my standard of comprehensive knowledge of subjects i.e. I know Middle Eastern history like I know my own d!@%. So a new mole appearing that space isn't going to escape my attention. I examined this growth for many months with growing concern. In fact, I'd be lying if I said it didn't influence me a bit into coming to Korea due to my lack of health insurance. Yes, I was that concerned.

FAST FORWARD!

Eight months into Korea, that mole I've been living with for a whole year begins concerning me again. See, I tend to ignore issues with my body with the belief that they'll solve themselves. So why the re-emergence of concern? Well, in Korea we get one station that is in English: AFN. AFN stands for American Forces Network and literally has no commercials. Instead of commercials, it has announcements warning against dangerous driving, sexual harassment, or it'll inform viewers of upcoming events, but sometimes it does some involving personal health. One came up and was all about skin cancer, the dreaded melanoma, the most common case of cancer in the United States (although I'm in Korea). The announcement talked about the five signs of melanoma:

• Asymmetrical skin lesion.
• Border of the lesion is irregular.
• Color: melanomas usually have multiple colors.
• Diameter: moles greater than 6 mm are more likely to be melanomas than smaller moles.
• Enlarging: Enlarging or evolving

Of these five, my new parter riding shotgun to my best buddy had four! DAMMIT! Obviously this is not a situation anyone wants to find themselves in, especially when dealing with such a sensitive area that is itself referred to as "a private part". Private, because we don't go around displaying it publicly, well most of us. But, I had put on my daddy pants and told myself that I needed to get this thing taken care of before it was too late.

How do you find a dermatologist in Korea? You ask your new boss :-( Of course, SHE is going to ask you why you need to go so when she calls them she can tell them. "Well, I have a strange mole that I'm afraid is melanoma." She asks, "Where is it?"...me, "In a private area."

So everyone at work knows that I have a mole in an uncomfortable spot and that it might also be a freakish mutant of a sucker destined to rob me of my life or at least of my "privates."

The next morning I headed to the dermatologist's office and here is where the history of my incident ends and the tale comes to fruition.

Walking into the office I had that distinct feeling many of us get when we are unsure of a situation that maybe we're in the wrong place. The office had pictures of beautiful women and the sign of the office began with "Laser Correction" and finished with "& Dermatology". Had I just walked into a skin care place and not a serious clinic? First thing to make me uneasy was the giggling of the five desk workers as they spotted me coming in with my timid appearance. I gave them the benefit of the doubt that they didn't speak English and were just concerned with who would volunteer to deal with me. Next thing I realized that made me worried was the evident fact that there wasn't a single man in the whole place. There I was, with a bunch of non-English speaking Korean women and I figured I would have to explain why I was there and I could imagine how fun that would be... So an actual doctor came out, a woman, and she sat down with me and explained that she spoke English and asked me why I was there. I explained to her all of my concerns but left out the location of the problem intentionally. I was still holding onto hope that there would be a male in the office.

Sure enough she takes me back to a doctors office and by GOD it's a man! Reconsidering that last statement it's a little odd that I'm excited to tell/show a doctor my crazy mole in my private area. Anyways I was relieved. I explained to him my issues and he asked to see it and without hesitation I showed him. Immediately he says, "it's not melanoma its _____, we can remove it with a laser." Instant relief! Wait....laser?

They send me back into the lobby and I sit where I had sat when I walked in. From my seat I could see all the workers at the front desk clearly. I saw them as the doctor handed them the pad with the information about my _____ . Also on the pad was the order for the procedure to be done. The girls immediately start giggling. All of them but one. I immediately knew that this one would be the individual that would have to perform the procedure on me. The girls are laughing while the one is shaking her head with a blank look, she turns and looks at me, she puts her head into her palm, she raises her head to look at me once more, and then she shakes her head again. All the while the rest of the girls are giggling. As a patient I just feel awesome about this situation (insert an obviously sarcastic tone).

I head back to the room to have the procedure done and luckily the male doctor comes in to assist the nurse. He busts out a death star style laser and begins warming that suck. In the meantime he takes a syringe with a 3 inch needle and sticks me in a place that's too close for comfort. For most of the procedure the nurse literally keeps her head under the bed I'm lying on like a ostrich with it's head in the sand. I think I'm scot-free from having to deal with this woman at all. Then, all of a sudden, the doctor leaves and gives her instructions in Korean. She then applies ointment to the area.

When everything was finished I headed to the front desk to pay. As soon as I'm within their line of sight the mirthful ladies continued their giggling. But, I have to say that I got the last laugh because the visit plus prescription medication cost me only $16!

It goes without saying that I will further be known as that "cool" guy that puts on so much sun block that he left with a visible layer that never seems to be absorbed or washed off.