His countenance was modified
Nursing a headache today.
*
Last night I was returning from the Big Top of Capitalism and had just pulled into the driveway, listening to this astoundingly average Marigold EP. An EP so average that its chief worth will be to keep it around in my record collection solely to instruct the curious and the musically wayward on the subject of average, blank early 00s rock.
As I began to carry out standard parking-the-car procedures, my right hand began to tingle. The steering wheel wasn't quite where my right hand expected it to be. Neither was the shift. And, as far as my right hand was concerned, my car keys were so slippery as to have been not only alive but also desperate to escape my grasp. I labored to fish them out of the ignition for way longer than is normally for any normally functioning person. As a normally functioning person mentally, however, I was well-aware of all of this.
*
I hadn't been drinking. I hadn't eaten anything strange. I hadn't been upset about anything.
*
This arm tingle continued as I tried to key open the side door. The keys still seemed like willful and evasive creatures. It was around this time that the tingle began to migrate heavenward along my arm, and even I, no doctor, knew enough to be concerned. Then again at the same time, I realized that I wasn't a doctor and further realized that an actual doctor might have dispelled such symptoms and such worry with a scoff and a waved hand. So it was important to consult some medical authority quickly, because we've all heard about strokes and sudden afflictions and people dropping dead.
*
In fact, just yesterday morning, I'd heard about a situation just like the one I thought was beginning to afflict me last night: a friend's significant other's cousin had very suddenly and without warning suffered what had to have been an aneurysm. This person had died where she'd stood.
*
On the kitchen table, underneath the lights which are often left on for me, was a manila envelope. Despite my affliction and concern about same, curiosity got the better of me. It was from the Fort Collins Police Department, and contained the statements of the attending officers on December 17th. There were four statements, all written in layman's terms. They were organized roughly in an order of descending pertinence to the case, so that the first officer there gave his account first, and the officers who took pictures and indexed the items in the room gave their accounts next, and so on. I read all of these in rapid succession without becoming upset. I did experience some conscious "huh" moments, as in "Huh, the white male they're discussing in these statements is my brother." I imagine that this account played a similar role for me that the 9/11 Commission Report played for direct victims of 9/11, in that that report, itself written in a direct, unadorned, and "you-are-there" style, probably served to reanimate that morning and its root causes by virtue of its simple language and swift plotting. Police reports, by way of their necessary emphasis on fact and what happened, are absorbing in the extreme.
*
I had not, at any point yesterday, heard any official word from the Las Vegas school.
*
I consulted WebMD and found out about Transient Ischemia Attacks, which portend strokes, and brushed up on what I knew about strokes. Because this is the kind of person I am, I decided action was necessary.
*
Discussions with family members revealed that I couldn't talk quite correctly. I had all of the right syllables, but these syllables were jumbled together and not forming the words of which they were part. I was speaking the way I imagine a dyslexic person reads. My thinking was relatively clear - I was thinking in clear sentences. But I was unable to speak the sentences I had in mind in an accurate, untroubled way. As anyone who knows me will understand, I was very conscious of how terrifying this notion was to me: I was unable to use my own language. Communication was just plain cut-off. And then of course there's an exponential increase in this effect when you're aware of it, because the terror I felt made it more difficult to think and speak, and the speech paralysis seemed to deepen and establish itself. Whatever had caused it, it threatened to become self-sustaining.
*
Speculation would suggest that my reading the report exaggerated my symptoms last night. Anyone have any notion of what those were symptoms of? But how odd it is that the symptoms began before I even arrived home. That's a coincidence, if you ask me. Still, the ensuing symptoms and the content of the report, and the fact that I didn't react to it as I read it but that, instead and strangely, I began to feel those symptoms accerlerate just after I'd read it, well then I have to say that the whole episode now seems to teach me something about the way the brain, when simply unable to process an overwhelming amount and type of information, must translate that information into something - if not into conscious understanding, then into another form of expression.
*
Anyway, my health's alright today. I hope all of you are well. I promise to talk about
a) Post-postmodernism / "The New Sincerity"
b) Recently acquired music
c) This particular posed photo of Jon and some other Gunner's Mates, about 12 sailors with guns and no-nonsense expressions, arranged in some Illinois hangar
soon.
*
Last night I was returning from the Big Top of Capitalism and had just pulled into the driveway, listening to this astoundingly average Marigold EP. An EP so average that its chief worth will be to keep it around in my record collection solely to instruct the curious and the musically wayward on the subject of average, blank early 00s rock.
As I began to carry out standard parking-the-car procedures, my right hand began to tingle. The steering wheel wasn't quite where my right hand expected it to be. Neither was the shift. And, as far as my right hand was concerned, my car keys were so slippery as to have been not only alive but also desperate to escape my grasp. I labored to fish them out of the ignition for way longer than is normally for any normally functioning person. As a normally functioning person mentally, however, I was well-aware of all of this.
*
I hadn't been drinking. I hadn't eaten anything strange. I hadn't been upset about anything.
*
This arm tingle continued as I tried to key open the side door. The keys still seemed like willful and evasive creatures. It was around this time that the tingle began to migrate heavenward along my arm, and even I, no doctor, knew enough to be concerned. Then again at the same time, I realized that I wasn't a doctor and further realized that an actual doctor might have dispelled such symptoms and such worry with a scoff and a waved hand. So it was important to consult some medical authority quickly, because we've all heard about strokes and sudden afflictions and people dropping dead.
*
In fact, just yesterday morning, I'd heard about a situation just like the one I thought was beginning to afflict me last night: a friend's significant other's cousin had very suddenly and without warning suffered what had to have been an aneurysm. This person had died where she'd stood.
*
On the kitchen table, underneath the lights which are often left on for me, was a manila envelope. Despite my affliction and concern about same, curiosity got the better of me. It was from the Fort Collins Police Department, and contained the statements of the attending officers on December 17th. There were four statements, all written in layman's terms. They were organized roughly in an order of descending pertinence to the case, so that the first officer there gave his account first, and the officers who took pictures and indexed the items in the room gave their accounts next, and so on. I read all of these in rapid succession without becoming upset. I did experience some conscious "huh" moments, as in "Huh, the white male they're discussing in these statements is my brother." I imagine that this account played a similar role for me that the 9/11 Commission Report played for direct victims of 9/11, in that that report, itself written in a direct, unadorned, and "you-are-there" style, probably served to reanimate that morning and its root causes by virtue of its simple language and swift plotting. Police reports, by way of their necessary emphasis on fact and what happened, are absorbing in the extreme.
*
I had not, at any point yesterday, heard any official word from the Las Vegas school.
*
I consulted WebMD and found out about Transient Ischemia Attacks, which portend strokes, and brushed up on what I knew about strokes. Because this is the kind of person I am, I decided action was necessary.
*
Discussions with family members revealed that I couldn't talk quite correctly. I had all of the right syllables, but these syllables were jumbled together and not forming the words of which they were part. I was speaking the way I imagine a dyslexic person reads. My thinking was relatively clear - I was thinking in clear sentences. But I was unable to speak the sentences I had in mind in an accurate, untroubled way. As anyone who knows me will understand, I was very conscious of how terrifying this notion was to me: I was unable to use my own language. Communication was just plain cut-off. And then of course there's an exponential increase in this effect when you're aware of it, because the terror I felt made it more difficult to think and speak, and the speech paralysis seemed to deepen and establish itself. Whatever had caused it, it threatened to become self-sustaining.
*
Speculation would suggest that my reading the report exaggerated my symptoms last night. Anyone have any notion of what those were symptoms of? But how odd it is that the symptoms began before I even arrived home. That's a coincidence, if you ask me. Still, the ensuing symptoms and the content of the report, and the fact that I didn't react to it as I read it but that, instead and strangely, I began to feel those symptoms accerlerate just after I'd read it, well then I have to say that the whole episode now seems to teach me something about the way the brain, when simply unable to process an overwhelming amount and type of information, must translate that information into something - if not into conscious understanding, then into another form of expression.
*
Anyway, my health's alright today. I hope all of you are well. I promise to talk about
a) Post-postmodernism / "The New Sincerity"
b) Recently acquired music
c) This particular posed photo of Jon and some other Gunner's Mates, about 12 sailors with guns and no-nonsense expressions, arranged in some Illinois hangar
soon.
posted by Wil at
9:10 AM
8 Comments:
whoa whoa whoa - what happened with the tingling and speech paralysis? did you get to a doctor? it feels like it's almost a metaphor, but isn't. or is it, and am i just freaking out?
By
Jaime, at 12:12 PM
It wasn't just a metaphor: it was all actual. But it's subsided: rest and deep breathing took care of it. And it was so strange and unlike anything I'd ever experienced before that it seemed not to require anything drastic. Is to do nothing with these symptoms, no matter that they're gone, an age-old error?
By
Wil, at 12:56 PM
yeah, not to be neurotic or paranoid, both of which i am, but i think a dr visit is in order. better safe than sorry, right? especially when the brain is involved. especially when the brain involved has an awesome novel that it needs to finish so i can read it.
By
Jaime, at 12:58 PM
I agree with Jaime, see the doctor. At the very least, the recent episode should be medically documented even if it's found to be "nothing".
When I get really upset I can't think of words and I use hand motions. Also, I can't spell (if I'm typing). Wierd, how quickly we lose language skills which take so long to perfect.
By
junebee, at 5:17 PM
Positively a MD is in order...there is a host of serious disorders as well as simple explaination for your symptoms...hypertension, spinal issues,ex. (pinched nerve). Was the tingling on both sides of the body or just one? What is your BP?You need a complete physical, bloodwork and possibly a visit with a neurologist and if it happens again get to the ER...
Be well
Love,
Mrs. C
By
Anonymous, at 5:42 PM
i experienced something like that at points in my exile. not the tingling, but the speech garbling. the inability to use language effectively. i became very frustrated. what i'm suggesting is it could be post-traumatic stress disorder. but yeah, go to a doctor.
By
Anonymous, at 8:32 PM
It's a classic migraine--not a stroke, a heart attack, or an actual metaphor.
By
Anonymous, at 9:13 AM
I'm relieved to hear that, anonymous, but what allows you your confidence? As for your literary correction - which manages the trick of being both subtle and ungentle - well, first of all, one certainly may liken a physical reaction like those symptoms described to the emotional experience that comes with reading such a document - it may not have been pretty, but neither was it wrong; and secondly, I've got to say, real or imagined, this episode outstripped then and outstrips now any issue of grammar or terminology. Don't you think so?
By
Wil, at 8:01 PM
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