Torpedo Tubes

March 09, 2007 | Category: Mother to the First Power

Here's the thing.

No.

Wait.

It's not that.

What I mean to say is that I realized that getting serious about the already serious was what was...

No, that's not it, either.

See, now, I've got myself confused.

Worst kept secret in the world? I withdraw in a crisis. Sink inside my little bluebell mind and blink slowly. Processing. Processing.

Sure, it looks like I'm all cool and Lauren Bacall.

Waitl. I mean, when I'm nervous I get chatty. Have you seen me nervous? It's like a string gets pulled between my shoulder blades.

But that's nervous.

That's not a crisis. That's not looking down at blood pouring out of a wound.

Once we get to blood, well, that's when I start to look sauve.

Except, it's not real.

I realized this about myself once upon a time at a Lesbian bar in Ravenswood.

I don't know how many years ago.

But there was this other group of women. And one of them knew my friend's girlfriend. They had dated at some point and it had ended badly. So there was my friend and her girlfriend and this other woman and people all shouting and throwing issues and unresolved relationships at each other like arrows and the bouncer (yes, there was a bouncer) was all posturing by the door and issuing warnings.

Then someone raced to the bathroom and then someone else started crying over by the jukebox.

I sat on my stool and drank my G&T and when Nina the bartender asked me if I knew what was going on, I said 'Hell, no," ordered another round.

Then somewhere there was a slap.

So the next thing you knew, we were kicked out and piled up in the hatchback driving back home and everyone was all talking at once and, finally, about 5 blocks from the bar, Lyn pulls the car over with a squeal and shouts "OK, I need to process."

But me? I was already deep inside my mind. I was halfway through processed, curled up in a mental ball, sorting it out. And Lyn looks at me, crowded up in the backseat with our friends, and said something like "You kept your cool."

And I said something like "Nah, I barely know what happend. I like to grab a head start on processing a situation. In fact I start processing so early I usually miss everything that happens after the start." Which means, see, that I seem all deadpan but really I'm just clueless and mentally constipated. Plus? Dealing with stuff seems to take me twice as long.

Ask CD. Everyone once in a while, he'll be like "What's wrong?" And I'll be like "You jacked up the credit card for a LEGO ROBOT THING??" And he'll be all, "Hon, that was 3 YEARS AGO!" But me? I just got it processed to the point where I can actually be in touch with being angry.

When I get quiet, it's usually because I'm tucked up inside the gooshy part of my mind. Dealing with something.

The "something" recently is Children's Memorial Hospital. And the doctor's office and the neurologist's office and the pharmacy.

I just have a hard time talking about what's happening while it's happening especially if it's the kind of happening that scares the ever-living crap out of me. I got to quiet down and let my mind process like a cracked-up gerbil in a wheel until I can breath like a human again.

18 months ago, Bear got sick and spiked a fever. It kept topping out around 104 (f). There was hives and vomiting and shaking. And it didn't go away.

The first couple of days, doctors said it could have been one thing. The next couple of days, well, doctors said maybe something else.

10 days. 10 days of extremely high fever, Emergency Leave from work, visits in and out of the clinic and the hospital, and even my mother flying out.

And then, some combination of drugs seemed to finally work. He got better.

No known cause. No explanation. At first, I couldn't care less. I was as giddy as a Muppet, singing with a Gibb brother on a rainbow of satin.

But then... it came back. Like that dammed cat in that song.

And faded.

18 very long months.

The consensus has been that it is an allergy. But he has tested no severe allergies to any of the common triggers.

He spikes a fever, sometimes a little rash, congestion. Then, a day or so later, fine again. Right now, he has severe sinusitis because it's been too much.

We know that because last week, they strapped him down with velcro and slid him back and forth through a Stargate machine. Much less frightening than the torpedo tubes, you know.

Two days in and out at Children's Memorial Hospital. Where helicopters land in loud thwup-thwups bringing sicker kids in for treatment. Where they give you those restaurant-style flashing beepers when you sign in so you can know when they're ready to see you. Where there's a McDonald's in the basement and $10 Mad Lib books in the bookstore.

As Hospitals go, it rocks. As childhoods go, Hospitals suck.

Bear? Is still sick. In fact, being sick is something that has become part of the weft and weave of our life. He's healthy maybe half his days. The rest of the time it is a swinging 40's dance of 'how healthy - how sick'.

And I hate it. I hate it so much that there are moments, away from him, that I gag and try not to throw up all that anger and fear and frustration that is rotting away inside of me.

But I don't know how to talk about it. My brain is still processing. Processing....

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