The auto call reminded me of the upcoming doctor’s appointment, to be 15 minutes early and bring all my medication
And judging by the patients in the waiting room one of the side effects of their medication had to be constipation

My Granny was a sweet woman with admirable baking skills but not a sack of pills
Sure she buttered her toast and fried her chicken but only had aspirin to cure her ills

A lot of today’s “diseases” hadn’t been invented such as high cholesterol and bone density
Granny never experienced a doctor’s lecture about thinning bones with the stare of cyborg intensity

She stayed active, tended her garden, cared for the grand kids and in winter was careful on ice
She spent her income wisely, used coupons as her purchases were always the lowest price

And she knew as she aged, she’d never be thirty again
But this is now and that was then

Grandpa smoked his Luckies, shaved every day and built shelves in his shed
He ate what Granny fixed, commented on the news and at 86 dropped dead

He never heard about high cholesterol, macular degeneration, osteoporosis or low T
Due to age occasionally claimed to be “stove up” but was only aware of his heart when he and the Parson would disagree

Perhaps our elderly were fortunate not to have their standard of living dictated by Big Pharma
They survived on their relationships with others, common sense and positive karma

They didn’t see a parade of specialists, given a pamphlet with perplexing statistics and be assigned a new high priced drug

But most of all never sat in a waiting room with two patients and five buttoned down Pharmaceutical reps all looking smug