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Happy New Year

by Steven Martin Cohen

Good evening ladies and gentlemen, and happy new year to you all. I am a homeless woman, and, as you can see, ladies and gentlemen, I have a bad leg. Other people who beg for money on the subway also have bad legs, and this is why I have my pants leg rolled up, so that you can see that I too, have a bad leg. While there are no visible injuries on my leg, the injuries are all internal, so you have to imagine what you might see if you had X-ray vision and could see through my skin into the damaged bones and muscle tissue beneath, where steel screws and plates and sutures hold my fragile body together to enable me to limp before you. My injuries have caused me endless pain and suffering. I was beaten to within inches of my life on this very train, ladies and gentlemen, and I don't mean to horrify or bore you with the details, but I feel compelled to tell you a little bit more about me and my present situation. I have an artificial hand which I won't show you, but suffice it to say that I go for dialysis twice a week and I'm on a waiting list for a new lung. I also have a steel plate in my head, and I'm going for more elective knee surgery as soon as I can afford it. I need root canals, and I have psoriasis, atherosclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis. I'm flaking and itching, and I have glaucoma, gingivitis, and gonorrhea. I have a bad liver and my spleen is dissolving as I speak to you. Besides having bile in my blood, I have scabs that won't heal, enormous worms living and breeding inside me, and I think there's a tumor growing somewhere in my sinus cavity. I have a bullet inoperably lodged deep in the base of my brain as a result of a dispute with an old boyfriend involving sex, money, and dope, or dope, money, and sex -- I don't remember which order or why it was him rather than any one of a thousand other guys I was forced to sleep with so I could support my habit. After the throat surgery I was forced to smoke unfiltered cigarettes for two years through a stoma, and the doctors refused to remove the tubes until I could provide proof of age and citizenship. Ladies and gentlemen, have you ever tried to get a Social Security card from a government employee when there's a tube sticking out of your neck? No, I'll bet you haven't. I have no ID. I don't belong to an HMO, and I have no night vision, and I can't see too well in the day either -- macular degeneration, they tell me. Ladies and gentlemen, my hands shake when I drink too much, and I haven't had a bowl of soup since puberty. I'm now thirty-seven, and I stopped having periods as a result of a fibroid the size of an official NFL regulation football. All my recessive traits are now dominant as a result of a compromised autoimmune system. Three years ago I accidentally swallowed an alkaline battery and it's still down there somewhere, along with part of a CD player and some bootleg CD's I bought on Fourteenth Street from a drug dealer killed by the cops who was only trying to buy milk for his wife and babies. One day I woke up in a dumpster missing a kidney, and shortly after that I turned to white collar employment in a Midtown law firm just to get even. I got fired after I was caught fraternizing with an answering machine, and I think they purposely did this right before I was supposed to get on the company health plan which, as you can see, ladies and gentlemen, nobody needs more than me. My toes have so much fungus growing on them that they look like ten little Chia Pets after a month of neglect. My mother just died of black lung disease and my dog has cancer. I have no father and neither does my dog. I can't afford day care and my internet provider is threatening to disconnect me. I have plastic ribs and tuberculosis. I've got bursitis, tonsillitis, hepatitis, conjunctivitis, retinitis, tendinitis, phlebitis, smegma, and gout -- septicemia, bulimia, and sickle cell anemia. I've had scabies, rabies, and stillborn babies. I've had rickets for the past twenty years, and my artificial valves are reaching the end of their useful life. I was gang raped by Swiss bankers in town for a convention, and I just broke another tooth last Thursday. My appendix could burst any second, and my bleeding ulcers are acting up as a result of the stress of being homeless. There are aneurysms in my brain, embolisms in my veins, and it hurts when I go to the bathroom. If you missed any of this you can call my 800 number or check out my web site at www.homeless.com/medical/disasters. Ladies and gentlemen, I need your help. Thank you and have a very happy new year.

Check out Steve's cartoons series: Screw the Planet