I pointed out to my dermatologist some flakiness at the tip of my nose and before you could say Michael Jackson he was sticking three needles in my proboscis, each sharp prick bringing an involuntary tear to my eye. It was a bit like having all your nose hairs plucked in three goes.
I expected the usual excision of the offending material, though the excess of needles should have been a warning. As soon as the desensitization took effect, the doctor got to work on an area that extended far beyond the original flakiness. I couldn't feel, but I could hear his vigorous labor, and it sounded like someone scraping ice off a windshield, except the windshield was my nose and the ice was my skin. It went on much longer than I had hoped, though I was happy to hear that the cancer had been caught early, before it had gone deeply into the skin, and I wouldn't lose part of my nose to the scalpel. Last night, when I removed the bandage, I looked as if I had just competed in a hands-tied-behind-your-back blueberry pie eating contest.
