Retention

 

I was brutally awoken from an otherwise restful sleep, this morning at around 4:30am, with a massive migraine.  Not as bad as some I've had, but far worse than most of the headaches I suffer through on a nearly daily basis. I managed to take something for it, a special prescription given to me by my physician, which usually works, but this morning, it failed to relieve me of any discomfort.  I did, however, manage to fall back asleep for another few hours.

When I finally woke up and got out of bed, the headache was still present, but also, for some strange reason, I was reminded of a girl from my youth.  It was grade school and her name was Ruth.

Ruth was a smart girl.  A very smart girl.  Actually, smart doesn't even come close to how brilliantly intelligent this girl was at that age.  She was kind of a frumpy awkward girl, but a lovely and overly friendly girl.  She was friends with everyone.  The reason she was so intelligent, leaps and bounds above everyone else in our grade and probably all the grades above us, was the fact that, for fun, Ruth had read the dictionary. Front-to-back, from aardvark to zyzzyva, this girl read every word, every definition, every... Everything. She read it all and better yet, she retained every last word.  If any student was struggling with how to spell something or what a word meant, they avoided looking the word up in the dictionary and instead consulted with Ruth.  Everyone did it and one would think that Ruth would get annoyed by all the extra attention, but as memory serves, she was always more than happy to oblige.  It was only the teachers who would get after the kids, urging them to stop harassing Ruth.

I don't know why, exactly, that after all these many many decades, that I would be reminded of a girl that had almost completely vanished from my memory, but I suspect it may be because I need to learn some information to further expand my current driver's license.

In order to qualify for more lucrative employment, I believe that I need to get my Air Brakes Endorsement.  I've already jumped through all the hoops to get to my Class 2, which allows me to operate a bus that exceeds 24 passengers, but I need to overcome that last hurdle, which is a difficult one for me, as I am not mechanically inclined and reading difficulty prevents me from retaining much of what I read.  I can count on one hand, how many books I've read where I was able to understand and remember everything I read on their pages.  For those who are counting, it's two and the dictionary is not one of those books.  (Actually, it's two of Mick Foley's books; Have a Nice Day and Tietam Brown ~ both wonderful books. I recommend them.)

Just the thought of picking up a book or anything, really, is an overwhelming daunting endeavour.  Almost scary, sometimes.  For someone who craves knowledge, it's incomprehensible as to why the mere thought of reading something, especially a text book, is scary.  I don't know if it's the frustration of not remembering or understanding the sentence I just read or what the reasons are. 

I remember when I first picked up the manual for learning Air Brakes and sitting in the backyard in the shade and reading the first paragraph.  Like, six times.  Maybe more and not comprehending or remembering a single word that I'd just read... Six times.  Maybe more.  All this before I bounced my head off the pavement, further depriving myself of mental retention.  Six times, maybe more, and it took me close to an hour before I finally gave up and tossed the books aside.  I've only recently found the manual, when I cleaned out my computer room where, incidentally, I'm currently writing this drivel. 

I spoke with some fine gentlemen, yesterday, who suggested that I watch some YouTube videos.  That everything I need to know for the written and visual exams at SGI (Saskatchewan Government Insurance).  That sounds promising.  I can set aside the cat and dog videos or watching Mike Finnegan f*ck with all his cars, long enough to learn something.

That's the only way I can learn things, is visually, not from reading.  Reading is my mortal enemy, which seems ironic, when you consider how much I enjoy writing.  Believe me, the irony is not lost on this guy, but like the song goes, "I'm a walking contradiction."  Can't read for shit, but I can write halfway decent.  Plus, I don't really compose as much as I simply type out the conversation I'm having in my head with an invisible audience.

I wonder what ever happen to Ruth, that girl from grade school.  What did she end up doing with that brilliant beautiful brain of hers.  I hope all that knowledge never went to waste.  That she's holed up somewhere, searching for the cure to cancer or why people love cat videos so much?  I'm just kidding on that last one, but I hope she's sharing her knowledge and intelligence with the world.  It'd be a shame for us all to lose that spark she had.

Peckerhead

A visit to my doctor the other day, revealed something about myself that I was not aware of prior.  I was seeing my physician regarding another matter, when she, my doctor, revealed that I had Psoriasis.

For weeks, my skin was dry and itchy and even going so far as cracking and bleeding, as well.  To look at me, I resemble a man prone to bar fights, the way my knuckles, hands and upper arms are riddled with sore patchy skin.  I'd thought it was just dry conditions in my house, as I have rarely been venturing out this past winter season.  That  coupled with the fact that I've stopped chewing my nails, thus allowing them to grow out and actually do damage when I scratch an itch.  I should trim them, but it's been decades since I've actually had fingernails that extended past my finger tips. 

I also believed it was a necessary sign of aging.  I'm not that that old, yet, but I recall seeing my Great Aunt, Chrissie, when she was getting up in years.  Her hands and lower arms resembled what mine currently look like.  Her skin was thin and frail and the slightest wind would cause her skin to crack open and bleed.  At least, that's what I initially believed, but in retrospect, there may have been a more obvious cause for those abrasions and wounds.

Growing up, I lived on a farm, just outside the city limits.  We could see the sprawling houses in the distance, advancing closer and closer, like trudging foot soldiers.  The land belonged to my Great Aunt, Chrissie.  When I was quite young, she had cattle, which were a source of milk for many years.  She also had chickens, which were also a source of sustenance.  My dad, also farmed the land for seed.  Grain, flax and canola was his preferred crops. Eventually, the cattle were sold off and only the chickens remained.

Like clock work, every morning and every evening, Chrissie would walk down to the coop and gather up the eggs, returning them to the house.  It was during these spells that I'm sure the chickens would lash out at the large hand groping them and stealing away their unborn offspring.  As dumb as chicken appear to be, surely there's some sort of motherly instinct that exists.  These pecks at Chrissie's hands and wrists, now that I think about it, is a more obvious cause for those wounds, than mere Psoriasis.

Startled poultry, lashing out and pecking at prying hands stealing their young, it was a natural reaction, but pales considerably for the surprise that would eventually befront them in the not-too-distant future.  If they thought cold hands were a nuisance, then they were in for quite the surprise.

I was quite young at the time.  I do recall that much.  Heading down to the chicken coop with my mom and sister in tow, meeting Chrissie who was armed with a flashlight.  We would stand at the doorway, accompanied by very little.  Only the darkness and the muffled squawks of panic that were coming from inside the old chicken coop.  We'd hear some rustling as Chrissie would return to the open door and hand over a couple chickens, which we'd carry, two-by-two, over to the far side of the cattle barn, the side where the horse, Jim, used to reside.  Jim was a work horse who did very little else than tow cow manure out to be spread over the field for fertilizer.  At least, I think that's all he did...  That and fart.  I do remember my dad saying that he'd be reigning the horse, when in mid-stride, Jim would raise his tail and unleash a nasty smelly fart.  That's for another day and another blog, maybe.

Two-by-two, the chickens would be delivered into small pens in the old horse barn, where they'd stay until the next morning when their fate would be sealed.  Like those who opposed King Henry VIII, these poor chickens who'd sacrificed their eggs for our consumption (not mine, I was deathly allergic to eggs in my youth), were now paying the ultimate price.

I was not allowed in the barn at this time, with good reason.  Even the idea of all those chickens being beheaded and having their feet amputated so violently, bothers me now.  The little heads and feet were discarded out the door, where my sister and I would retrieve them and feed them to the dogs.  (*Editor's Note: I took a long pause here, pondering those actions.  It's disturbing.)  A few pecks and punctures were a small price to pay, I suppose, considering the huge sacrifice those chickens would ultimately pay.

These days, I don't want to know how the food gets to my table.  I like pigs.  Wouldn't want to hurt them in any way, but I also love bacon.  The method that gets that bacon from the farm to my table, doesn't concern me.  Nor what chickens have to endure, as well as lamb, beef, whatever the case.  Blissful ignorance is on my side.  As long as I honour the animal that gave it's life to feed me, I believe that's good enough.  The thought of becoming a vegan, based solely on fear of hurting animals, is weak and stupid, but that's a blog for another time.  Bon Appétit!

"The method that gets the meat to my table,
doesn't concern me.  Fried chicken is good!"

Be Calm. It Was Just a False Alarm

I'm not going to lie to you, but it's been kind of a tense few weeks for yours truly.  About three weeks ago, in preparation for a visit to my diabetic counselor, I was sent for blood work, to monitor various levels of my blood in my daily battle with Type II Diabetes.  Within a couple of hours, I received an urgent phone call from my doctor, in reference to the test results.  Normally, I don't concern myself too much with such trivialities, but when a physician, especially one as busy as mine, takes time out of her busy day to place a personal phone call, one has no choice but to sit up and take notice.  She informed me that my platelet count was abnormally low and that I should return for another blood test the following week.

In the olden days, before the internet, news such as this would cause the mind to race in a thousand directions, imagination taking over and running thousands more scenarios.  These days, with the advent of the worldwide web, a diagnosis is available at one's finger tips and I wasted no time typing "low platelets" into Google and was not very encouraged by the results.  Web MD listed a few culprits, including Leukemia and Colon Cancer, but I wasn't experiencing any of those symptoms, so I quickly discarded them.  However, I was intrigued by the list symptoms for Prostate Cancer. I'd been experiencing some oddities in the weeks prior and Googled those symptoms which brought up Prostate Cancer as a possible cause.  Now seeing the ugly name rear it's head, once more, I became a little more concerned.

By and by, I never let it get me down, believing "It is what it is".  In years past, I've always believed that if I ever faced off with cancer, that I could and would beat it, so these past few weeks were definitely a test of that belief.

The following week came and I returned to the clinic for a follow-up blood test, only this time, I never received a follow-up phone call from my doctor.  A week came and went, followed by a second and still no telephone call from my doctor.  "No news is good news." they always say, and so I continued on, like there was nothing to worry about.

I saw my doctor, today, for my usual monthly visit and we touched base on the "low platelet" issue.  She chalked it up to a mistake made by the lab, as it's not normal for one's platelet count to fluctuate such a drastic amount within a few days of testing.  We each breathed a sigh of relief, mine much heavier than hers, I'm sure.

I've had a lot of close calls, in recent years, close calls and near misses that I've had to face on my own.  I know I have a small circle of friends that, if I needed to, I could lean on someone's shoulder.  However, I'm not the sort to trouble others with my bullshit.  When I broke my back a couple of years ago, that was a tough ordeal to get through on my own.  I'm not going to lie, but I managed to get through it.  When I had pneumonia, before that and X-rays discovered what was described (to me) as a "black mass" on my lung, I'll admit that was a heavy burden to shoulder, too.  All-in-all, recent years have really been taking their toll on me, emotionally, but god damn it, I'm grappling each one, wrestling it to the ground and rising above it all.  I'm like the Batman, only without the cool threads or the kick ass car.  I'm an excellent survivor.

Mr. Winky's Big Day Out

After much concern regarding a health issue, I finally consulted my doctor. Given that it dealt with such a personal subject, I'd been hesitant up to that point to mention anything, but on that day, I finally decided I'd had enough.

The doctor ran a couple tests in house and decided that it wasn't anything associated with my having Type II diabetes.  I breathed a sigh of relief on that point, however I wondered what exactly was the cause of my problem.  A few more tests were ordered up by my physician and on my way I went.

A couple days later I retrieved an official looking letter from my mailbox.  Typed on letterhead from the Saskatchewan College of Physicians, the note informed me that I was to attend an ultrasound appointment, followed up by a Cystoscopy a couple weeks following that.  I've had many ultrasounds over the years for a plethora of injuries I've sustained.  I knew there was nothing to fret about in regards to that, but by name alone, Cystoscopy sounded invasive and complex.  I read on in the letter, which vaguely described the nature of that test.  Thank the heaven's for Google, as I looked up the definition of Cystoscopy and was horrified by what I learned.  Long story short, the doctor freezes my downstairs area then shoves a camera in through my pee-pee.  Ho-ly-f*******ck!

So for a few weeks I had that to look forward to, even going so far as sharing on Twitter that while people would be outside enjoying the hot summer weather, your's truly was going to be in the hospital, legs up in the stirrups and a camera being raked through me like a piston hammering through the cylinder of a small block Chevy.

Today was the big day.  I swallowed my pride and all my fears.  There was nothing I could do now, but to face the music and deal with this adversity like I do every other roadblock in life.  In fact, while I sat "commando" in the waiting room, a thin cotton fabric being the only thing separating "me" from the menagerie of odd looking persons in the room with me, I noted a parade of attractive nurses strolling past.  "I wonder if one of them is my nurse." I thought to myself, then realizing how embarrassing it would be, them eyeballing me in my state of vulnerability, or worse, my rising to the occasion.  It might be flattering, on some level, but highly inappropriate and embarrassing.

Soon I heard my name being called.  The nurse introduced himself as Emanuelle.  A him, I thought, this was going to be less embarrassing.  Emanuelle appeared to be an African transplant.  His accent was thick and I had him repeat his name, as I failed to catch it the first time.  He had long hair that was twisted into thin dreadlocks and it was tied back and spilling out from under his nurses cap.  It was at this precise moment I realized that I was going to have to write a blog about this.

Mere seconds ago, I was worried about popping wood in front of my nurse, and now I see my nurse is actually a young virile man.  A strapping young fella. An African-American young fellow and immediately my thoughts went to the stereotypes of young African-Americans and the incredible girth that they sport, "down there".   Although he is likely very professional in his application of medicine, this dude is likely going to snicker when he sees my insignificant appendage.  I know the comparison goes without saying, but it's still a bruise to the old ego.

He had me sit on the gurney to wait for the doctor's arrival, who entered the room almost immediately.  I'm relieved to see that he's of Asian decent and before any question of his fitness as a physician enters my mind, my self-consciousness wanes away believing that as insignificant as I'm going to be stacked next to the black guy, I gotta be monstrous over the Asian doctor's peanut.

I was instructed to lie back on the gurney while the nurse was going to clean and sanitize my area.  Again the thought of an uprising interrupted my usual thoughts.  Baseball, I thought.  Baseball.  The most boring sport on TV, that'll keep me "relaxed".  If I thought getting wood in the hands of the female nurse would be embarrassing, it'd go double, triple...,  a million times more embarrassing in the hands of a dude.

Next the doctor brought over the device that would he'd be doing the exploratory with.  I looked at him and said, "I don't think that's going to fit."  He smiled and assured me, "It'll fit.  Don't you worry."  This caused me to breathe heavily.  I laid back and stared at a poster on the ceiling.  It was a monkey with the caption "I've gotta learn to relax."  The nurse, Emanuelle, knelt down next to my head and pointed up at the poster and said, "Look at the monkey.  Take deep breaths and exhale through your mouth."

"Monkey?" I said, "I thought that was a mirror."  Emanuelle chuckled and patted me on the shoulder as he rose to his feet.  The procedure then began.  The freezing went in and ironically burned like a roman candle.  It felt like hot lava being pouring into me, a single droplet at a time.  The scorching sensation soon dissipated, but not for long.

What I initially believed would be equated to shards of broken glass being etched into my wiener, via the Google explanation, the discomfort associated with the procedure wasn't quite as violent or painful, but it wasn't a joyous experience either.

After all was said and done, the doctor informed me that everything checked out.  My bladder and all points in between checked out and appeared healthy.  I can now breathe another heavy sigh of relief, but can't help but wonder what the cause of my issues are.  The doctor suggested watching my diet.  Yay..!  A diet already limited by allergies, could soon become even more concentrated.  Pretty soon, I'll be sucking nutrients out of a f**king tube, like the astronauts do.

I sat down on the toilet, following the exam, and tried to urinate.  The freezing had really taken hold, I couldn't feel anything except something that felt like rusty razor blades.  I tried repeatedly, but believe that I'd failed.  I got up and looked into the bowl.  Something came out, to my surprise.  I hope I don't have any "accidents" on the way home, I thought.