The House of God

by Samuel Shem

Gomer is an acronym: Get Out of My Emergency Room—it’s what you want to say when one’s sent in from the nursing home at three A.M.” “I think that’s kind of crass,” said Potts. “Some of us don’t feel that way about old people.” “You think I don’t have a grandmother?” asked Fats indignantly. “I do, and she’s the cutest, dearest, most wonderful old lady. Her matzoh balls float—you have to pin them down to eat them up. Under their force the soup levitates. We eat on ladders, scraping the food off the ceiling. I love . . .” The Fat Man had to stop, and dabbed the tears from his eyes, and then went on in a soft voice, “I love her very much.” I thought of my grandfather. I loved him too. “But gomers are not just dear old people,” said Fats. “Gomers are human beings who have lost what goes into being human beings. They want to die, and we will not let them. We’re cruel to the gomers, by saving them, and they’re cruel to us, by fighting tooth and nail against our trying to save them. They hurt us, we hurt them.”