NEEDHAM, Mass. It’s only ten o’clock in the morning, but Mort Klark is sitting down at an outpatient clinic here to eat a heavy meal that looks like a picture from a TV dinner box; Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes, peas and carrots, and apple crisp for dessert. “I don’t usually fill up early in the day like this,” he says, “but it’s for a good cause.”
“When that kid gets a dose of my special sauce, he’ll be as ornery as me!”
After he finishes, the 59-year-old Klark rolls up his shirt sleeve to give bile, a dark green to yellowish brown fluid produced by the liver and discharged into the small intestine after eating. “I’m not crazy about needles, but I did get a free meal out of it,” he says with a calculating laugh that contains an element of smug self-satisfaction at the bargain he’s getting.
The beneficiary of Klark’s gift is 23-year-old Tim Verbleck, who suffers from Williams Syndrome, a genetic disorder that causes him to be nice to everyone. Victims of the disease, sometimes referred to as “Cocktail Party Syndrome,” are indiscriminately outgoing, friendly and trusting, behaviors that are welcomed by some but off-putting to others. Klark, a man made cynical by sharp practices inflicted on him in his nearly four decades in business, was a perfect match because his personality causes him to produce surplus quantities of bile, which has been linked to aggression in humans since classical antiquity.
“Thanks to unlimited access to patient records, I can find out where that cute guy lives!”
“Bile is associated with grumpy people such as Mr. Klark, who are in the majority,” says Dr. Eliot Glonder of the Massachusetts Liver Institute. “It’s not clear which group is the problem, so we sometimes refer to those who don’t have Williams Syndrome as suffering from TROUS, or ‘The Rest of Us Syndrome.’”
Using an experimental procedure, Verbleck receives a slow-drip infusion of Klark’s bile intravenously. “He’s cute,” says receptionist Gail Griswold, who was won over by Verbleck’s friendly, outgoing personality when he complimented her on her smile, her outfit, the pictures on her desk and her choice of rollerball marker color when he checked in. She plans to slip him a note to ask if he’d like to meet after work for drinks at a nearby Applebee’s, and tentatively extends her hand to get his papers when he emerges from the treatment room.
So cute!
“I hope that didn’t hurt too much,” she says with a giggle as she prepares to dot the letter “I” in the word “Paid” with a smiley-face to signal her desire for friendship.
“Yeah, right,” Verbleck snarls. “Like you people give a rat’s ass about anything except your $100 co-pay.”
I hope that wears off after a while! 😀
I was in the next bed over “venting my spleen” because I had something “stuck in my craw.” Not sure how my anger got into my spleen or what part of the body the craw is, but …ouch. Love your sense of humor Con!