OheMGee!
Those doors...if only I could remember what they looked like. And that sound--! Was it...wheezing? One thing is certain. If I'm to find answers, I'm going to have to use my computer like I always do. Heading down the hall to my room, I find that my computer is already on, the following logo prominently displayed:
Mysterious™....this does conjure a vague recollection of something...a promise made, and a question pondered. I'm disoriented now, and feel I've undergone a great shock. I close my eyes, my shoulders tensing as my fingers begin a frenetic dance across my keyboard. I've had moments like this before....before...before...
I don't need my mom or my dad or anyone else! Strangers are unpredictable and friends may betray, but I have complete control over my imagination! If there's a damsel to be impressed by my abilities, I can decide what those are and how impressed she is! I am a SUPERHERO!
”Oh my G--!!!”
I've fallen! Why did I think I could climb down this tree stump face first? At least the grass broke my fall. I need comfort! And my face feels warm and a little wet. I run to my mother, who calmly takes out a tissue and blots what she thinks only is a bloody nose. I never see the split nostril or lip, or the teeth visible through my closed mouth, but I read in her widening eyes and sudden cries for my father the OheMGee moment she's just experienced.
Time passes....
I love Christmas. I'm such a spoiled only child, that it's all about ME. What did my parents get me? My aunts? My uncles? My cousins? I'm a kid. My parents do all the shopping. I have no idea why they get so tense running from mall to mall with a sheet of looseleaf, crossing off names as they buy things and often yelling at each other. This is the BEST time of year EVER! How can anyone yell? I love Sundays, and cutting up the catalogs from the toy stores, circling and handing them scraps of paper.
I'm never happy. I have one aunt and uncle that invariably buy me the best toys. Most of my family buys me clothes. My parents get me some of the things on my list but never all, and a lot of things I didn't ask for that I suspect my mom only picked up because they were on sale. She's so cheap. My dad fixes cars. We have two cars and three cats. Surely we have money? Is it too much to expect EVERYTHING? Surveying this month's pathetic haul I suspect they've gotten me even less this year, and not one thing from my top ten list. There is one more box, but it's probably the vacuum cleaner my dad joked about buying my mom. It's way too big for--
”Oh my G--!!!”
It took a moment to register, but my mom said I had one more present to open! I fly across the room, more excited than I've been about presents in years, my little hands tearing at the paper to reveal Castle Grayskull! I can't believe they really got it! Suddenly I don't care about the quantity of gifts I've received. Before I know what I've done, I've run to the nearest parent and I've hugged my dad and given him a kiss on the cheek. Embarrassed, I quickly run and hug and kiss my mom instead. She thinks it's cute, but he's already wiping his cheek and grumbling that it's not right, that boys shouldn't kiss their fathers. By this point I'm already back at the tree and engaging in the required assembly, so their conversation fades into the background even as
Time passes....
It's taken SO long to get here, and now here we are. A good friend had warned me that if I didn't kiss a girl at the end of the first date, REALLY kiss her and not just on the cheek, that she'd never see me as anything more than a friend. Old as I am, I've never remotely been close to the situation I'm in. Worse, it's already our SECOND date. Given my friend's advice, I'm actually surprised to have been given a second chance.
We're sitting in her car, talking about how bad the film we've just seen is. We've actually exhausted the topic, and she's driven me back to where I had parked. I'm bad at talking to people in general, especially girls, and I'm struggling to buy more time. Somehow the subject has shifted to Halloween costumes, and I'm silently cursing the pathetic dork that I can't help being. She talks about dressing up as a Hershey's Kiss one year, and the conversation dwindles down to an awkward silence. “Kiss, huh?” I say, not believing my luck and at the same time still stalling, and cursing myself for doing so. She repeats the word “kiss” in such a soft and tender tone, and the silence is a magnet. I lean toward her, ignoring the stick shift digging in to my side, and plant a quick kiss on her lips.
”Oh my G--!!!”
I'm dizzy as I mutter goodnight, and start to get out of the car. One foot is on the ground before my heel turns and I'm back in the car.
”Oh my G--!!!”
I've now kissed her, a beautiful intelligent girl, firmly on the lips not once but twice. It's intoxicating, and dangerous. I can't understand why she's not yelling at me, or slapping me, or looking nauseous like most of the girls a lowly troll like myself had even dared say “hello” to. If anything, she has a small amused smile but I know I'm pushing my luck. This time I'm saying “goodnight” and leaving for sure.
”Oh my G--!!!”
What am I doing? I've kissed her THREE TIMES. By now she must think me a pervert, this time I leave for real, and the whole ride home I can't believe how AWESOME kissing is. I'm also certain that she was being polite, and I've crossed lines that will effectively end any future with her. I've gone TOO FAR. At work the next day, I apologize profusely for my behavior and she seems more puzzled than anything else. We'd date for another two and a half years, and those three small pecks would evolve into three-hour full-blown make-out sessions and....
Time passes....
Ow. What have I been eating? My stomach has felt like there was a knife in it for weeks now. There was that stomach flu or whatever it was last year, but thankfully THOSE symptoms went away. Now, not only have the embarrassing symptoms returned, but I can't sleep unless I lie on my side and I haven't eaten more than a waffle or two a day. Anything more hurts. Good thing I finally caved in and called the doctor. I've got an appointment this afternoon, and I've taken a half day here at the office. I'm sure it will be nothing, possibly even stress. I certainly haven't felt right since she left me. It's been two years, and it still seems like I'm going through motions, living in an alternate reality that isn't the way things were supposed to turn out. Right now though, I'm dizzy and I've got to eat something. I think there are bagels in the kitchen.
A small nibble is all I can take before my face starts tingling. I'm sweating, and my desk seems so far away. I make it to my chair just short of my knees giving out, and something POPS in my right side, accompanied by a hot gurgle.
”Oh my G--!!!”
Something is very wrong. My ears are ringing and every inch of my flesh is going numb. Sweat beads on my forehead and I'm too weak to even lift my phone or cry out for help. People walk by as I lay my head on my desk. I can hear them, and it sounds like they're at the end of a very long tunnel. No one talks to me or asks how I'm doing. This is it. I'm going to die at my desk, and with my ability to blend in my corpse may go unnoticed for quite some time.
No.
No, my parents will notice when I don't come home. The doctor will notice when I don't show up for my appointment. Somewhere in the dark void I've drifted in to I find light. God gives me the strength to open my eyes, to push my phone off the receiver and dial my parents. I can barely speak but manage to croak out enough words to let them know I need a ride home, that I can't drive. Thank God for my parents. I close my eyes and rest for the next half hour, remaining conscious but very still, building the strength to get to the elevators and out to the parking lot. By now some coworkers who I occasionally have lunch with are heading out to lunch themselves, and notice me leaning on the elevator wall. I put on a brave front and don't tell them all the gory details. My parents are waiting and I'm a little embarrassed to be seen getting picked up by “mommy and daddy” at 25 years of age. I'll probably never be friends with these people now, but at the moment I'm more concerned with survival. It will be three days after I'm hospitalized before doctors diagnose my Meckel's Diverticulum. It will be another week of recovery before my intestines heal and I'm allowed to eat, and finally go home. At the end of a month I'm able to go back to work, and happy to still have a job...
Time passes....
My dad is always in a hurry when it comes to parades. He professes to love music, but gets as stressed about getting to gigs on time as he does when he's having trouble repairing a car. I really SHOULD be driving. I've been getting dizzy though and the doctors have yet to find the cause. I'm afraid I may pass out behind the wheel, and I'm not entirely convinced that my symptoms are caused by that very anxiety in a vicious cycle. I don't know when or if this recent development will change, but right now my dad is freaking out because we're in the wrong place for the Fourth of July parade.
Usually we meet at the firehouse, near the end of the route, and a bus takes us to the beginning two miles up the road. This year, the band is actually meeting at the beginning. We've still got an hour before the parade starts, and the back roads won't be blocked off yet, but he likes to be early. I'm finding it hard to keep up with a 74-year-old man racing back to where we've parked. We jump in the car, pull up to the stop sign a few feet from where we'd parked, look both ways, and continue on. I notice a minivan coming at us from the right but it's quite a ways away. The I notice that they don't have a stop sign for their portion of the intersection, and I realize how close they suddenly are. I yell to my dad “THEY'RE NOT STOPPING” and he only has a split second to react. I probably would have hit the brakes, but he floors it. I think we've made it when I turn and see a radiator grill a few feet from my face and then
”Oh my G--!!!”
It's oddly quiet after the crashing sound. I look at my dad gripping the wheel. He doesn't look happy. Outside, the world is spinning. We come to a stop, now facing the intersection from the opposite side, having been struck on the right rear of our vehicle and spun around a full 180 degrees. I stumble out, and walk around the back in disbelief, seeing our rear bumper completely torn off on one side and the dent in the side of our trunk. The van was doing far more than 30MPH in a residential area, and never even hit the brakes until after the impact. Had my dad hit the brakes as I would have done, I would have been dead. Instead I'm alive and hearing the wife of the other driver yelling at US in a shrill tone that we didn't stop. My dad finally gets out of the car even as I'm calmly letting her know that we did stop, and even finding the patience to call her “ma'am”. I managed over 29 years on this Earth without getting in a car accident, and it would be my dad who would break an even longer personal streak. Several months later when I'd be rear-ended at light while driving to work in my own car, I'd once again marvel at my luck and realize why there were so few occasions in which I'd take the Lord's name in vain.
What's shocking to one person is about normal for me.
Whew. So that's what it was all about. A split lip. A cherished gift. A first kiss. Massive internal bleeding. A car accident. I suppose if I went with movies and television shows, it would have been a lot harder to keep it to five.
I think I see that door again. I think it's time I paid our host a visit again, and let him know what I've brought to the party....
Labels: Blog Party
posted by MCF at 11:00 PM
1 Comments:
Castle Grayskull ... that's an awesome gift! I never really liked He-Man but loved playing with the Castle at my friend's house.
Post a Comment
<< Home