Short Dramas and Plays

Sacred Appointment

by Terry Barlow
02/02/19
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A psychiatrist enters his kitchen at home and says to wife (could as easily be female psychiatrist greeting her husband)

Psy. – Well, here I am the mechanic of coping mechanisms, the dismantler of escape and defense mechanisms at your service, ready to fix the world still another time!

Wife – Good morning, dear. (tolerantly)

Psy – Let me give you your 12 hugs, honey. (Begins to hug her repeatedly, counting each hug as he goes). One……two ….three.. you know how important these are to our emotional health the research shows..

Wife – (interrupts him)  But, dear, don’t you think the researchers intended that there be some spontaneity about the hugs, and they be spread over the course of the day not all at once…a little less mechanical perhaps?

Psy – But as I said I’m the mechanic of coping mechanisms so…. Ha!….it’s my nature to be mechanical.  Mastery over mystery I always say!  (Aside) Oh, I’m so clever I can hardly stand myself. ( Wife just shakes her head helplessly and a little hopelessly.)

Scene 2 (Psychiatrist arrives at his office where he encounters first patient whom he greets by clapping, pointing, gesturing thumbs up and exclaiming in his customary way, “Timex!”

Patient – Timex?

Psych – You remember the watch don’t you? Takes a licking and keeps on ticking! ( Smiles broadly) That’s our motto around here. My patients are all survivors in one way or another.

Patient – Never have been comfortable with that approach,  I’m a person not a watch.  I am aiming at something more than mere survival.

Psych – It’s fine to at least aim for that but…

Patient - What's that box of bandaids on your desk for?

Psych - Never know when we might need them, emrgencies, you know.

Patient (continues) Actually I came to tell you I won’t need these sessions anymore, I have Jesus Christ in my life now.  I had an encounter the other day…..(begins to describe a personal encounter with the risen Christ and the resulting surrender and oncoming sense of purpose, and how that had impacted the quality of his days since.

Psych – (writes on his pad shown overhead.  “Delusional”)

(Patient goes on to describe how deep the peace that has invaded his life, and how colorful the sky and the grass, and the trees and what a desire to sing has filled his soul.  He begins to sing right there, ” Happiness is to know the Savior, having a change in my behavior, living a life within His favor…”)

Patient - Yes, if there's one word that describes the change in me best, it would be the word "purposeful".......

(Psychiatrist writes on his pad: “in denial….jargon aside, just plain nuts!”  But as patient continues singing the Psychiatrist finds himself tapping his foot which he struggles to stop himself from doing but can’t seem to help himself.  Patient is swaying now as he continues singing and psychiatrist joins him in that as well unable to stop himself swaying.  Psychiatrist slaps himself and later tries dousing himself with water too but to no avail, as he follows patient clapping and swaying freely.   Patient by now has jumped up and begun to dance a little jig as if he is flying like a butterfly.  Psychiatrist throws down his pad and joins the butterfly dance around his chair, and then suddenly stops as if snapping out of this spell.  But instead he picks up his pad and pen and writes under earlier diagnosis ” just plain nuts………. about

JESUS!” (Pad shown on overhead)  and gets back up to resume flight dance… singing now…)
…to know the Savior, having a change in our behaviour…