American prudishness

In "A Room With A View," a priest tells a story of how he was in the bath at his pension, and the cleaning lady walked in. She told him, "fa niente. Sono vecchia." Or, "don't bother. I'm old." The characters in the book laugh at this Italian nonchalance with nudity. Obviously that would never happen in England, and nor, for that matter, in the States.

The other day, Anne, our landlady, told me a story. She needed an EKG exam, one of those ones where you run on a treadmill or cycle in place while they monitor your body's response. Figuring she would need to strip down from her everyday clothing, she brought shorts and a t-shirt with her. The exam room was at one end of a hallway which was filled with other people waiting for the same exam. As each person was called, they would briefly see into the room before the door closed again.

When Anne was finally called in, she noticed that, as is common in Italy, there's no changing room, there's no separate office, it's just one room with an exercise cycle and two doctors. She asks if she should wear the shorts and t-shirt, and they say, "no, nothing but her underwear." Now, I've never had a stress test like this in the states, but I am pretty sure you would be given at least one of those paper hospital gowns. So at this point in the story I'm already cringing. My American prudishness cannot fathom stripping down in front of not one, but two male doctors, and having nothing with which to immediately cover back up. But Anne laughs and says this is just Italy.

So she strips down, they put all the little suction-cup monitor things on her, and she climbs up on the bike to start the test. It's one of those exercise cycles with the moving handle bars, so she's quickly huffing and puffing away, cycling and pumping her arms. I'm trying to imagine myself doing this in the nude, and I'll admit, I'm having a hard time not seeing myself putting my clothing back on and just walking out. But then, Anne tells me, as she's in the midst of the test, the cleaning lady opens the door from the hallway full of waiting people, and has a discussion with the doctors on whether she can come in and clean. I almost fell over. Anne's laughing about it, and that's why she's so happy in Italy. I'll stick to my paper gowns and long waits in private exam rooms....