A day in Brazil

I spent Sunday in Brazil... the movie, not the country. Although the country may be like the movie, but I certainly hope not.

It all started with a dream Saturday night, in which I had a picnic with my friend Devin. We ate very strange junk foods, and I woke up the next morning with a pain in my side. Must be from the picnic, I assumed and went on with my day. For very specific reasons involving fiction, I have recently become accepting of - and paranoid about - the wall betwixt dream and reality collapsing. At any rate, as the day progressed, I found this slight tummy-ache to be culminating into what felt like a reenactment of Braveheart within my intestines. Dad and I ran out of church like a Baptist in a Synagogue, and got me over to hospital (more commonly known in America as "the hospital"). And as I'm sure we've all had the surreal experience of sitting in a crowded emergency room, I will skip ahead for the sake of sooner reaching Brazil. (If you haven't had the pleasure yourself of sitting through such a Hell as an emergency room, check out Scorsese's film "Bring Out the Dead". You'll get a pretty good idea of what it's like.)

I awoke later in a stale gray room and was in somewhat of a daze. The pain in my "lower abdomen" was less than when I had come into the emergency room a few hours hours prior, but it was still nagging and I squirmed as best I could to escape it. My arm was stuck with I.V. and wrapped in tape. Noting my floppy wrist, the nurse had kindly strapped a straight board to my arm/hand, which served its purpose and also doubled as a cumbersome handcuff of weight.

As I steadily came to, I realized I was alone and a morphine drip droned on beside me. Oh goody. At this rate, I would soon feel not so alone as the Killer Whale stickers on the ceiling would come to life and swim about the florescent lights. Nurses could be heard bustling along the halls outside. Then suddenly, a thud and crash came from the next room over. Maybe someone fell, I wondered. But the ruckus continued and it became clear someone had gone mad and was making these sounds of violence on purpose. After a few bouts of this, I suppose the man grew faint or was restrained. A nurse spoke slowly and clearly to the agitated patient.

"Do you know what year it is, sir?" she asked firmly. These were the words she said aloud, but what I heard in my head was something like, "Here we go, Kevan. Another trippy day in the hospital!" I heeded the warning and sighed carefully.

All day, I had an urge to listen to Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors, but my iPhone would not cooperate (way to go, Steve Jobs). Instead, my dad sat with me while I dozed in and out of consciousness, and listened to me ramble nonsensically about theories and fiction and history and whatnot. At some point, my pastor Alan came by to visit for a spell and it was agreeable for the nurses to have two counselors (myself and Alan) and two pastors (Alan and my dad) in fellowship together. Then came time for tests.

I was made to drink a large cup of orange liquid. It was the first bit of sustenance to grace my lips all day, and its flavor resembled that of flat SunKist with a touch of copper and... something otherworldly (not in the good way, like Cheerwine). I feared it would take me all day to drink, but somehow managed it down in mere minutes.

After this, they took me, lying flat on the rolling bed, from my room and down several hallways to a room that looked like the inside of a spaceship. The room was cold and dimly lit until they mercilessly flipped on the alien brights overhead. I blinked until my eyes would adjust, but by then the lights were off again. Although this was only a few seconds, it was a frightening time in which I was poked and twisted and shifted onto another bed. The nurse asked me mechanically a series of question that could have been summed up by a brief glimpse at my medical history file. No, I'm not a smoker/drinker. No, I haven't had cancer. No, I'm not Diabetic. No, I don't have Sickle Cell Anemia... do I look African American to you? Thanks. Once the questions and transfer were complete, I regained my morphine-drenched wits and studied my surroundings as well as I could. The new cot I found myself lying on was connected to a white tube that I could only guess they planned to scan me through soon. The cot also had straps, which they proceeded to tie over me without remorse. It was about this time that I began humming "All the Way, My Savior Leads Me" and praying for the good Lord's swift return. Once I was strapped tightly, the nurses left the room. I was again alone and bound for immobility. The silence was haunting and my head was locked in place so that I couldn't see if anyone was approaching or even near by. In fact, I may not have even been alone in the room! But the silence and lack of vision suggested otherwise.

The cot then began to move itself toward the cylinder, which also came to life. As I was drawn into the tube, it became a spinning vortex of machinery and lights. The sounds it generated were deafening and I was overwhelmed by the illuminated pictures before me. Just above my head were two faces printed on the wall of the machine. One was a man smiling with his mouth half-opened. The other was a man with his mouth closed and cheeks puffed out. Then a robotic voice came through some hidden speakers and said, "Breath in." At this, the smiling face began blinking with a sort of green glow. The voice came again, "Hold your breath." This time, the smiling face went dim and the puff-cheeked face released a sort of orange glow. I held my breath as the bed moved slowly through the vortex and then stopped midway to scan my area of issue. This process repeated several time, and I think it was by the 3rd round that I had resolved to match the glowing faces as closely as possible. So I smiled candidly when I breathed in and I puffed my cheeks dramatically when I held my breath. And this proved to make the whole experience not only more bearable, but in fact somewhat enjoyable.

By the time my soulless nurses returned, loosed my bonds, transferred me back to my own bed, and set me back in my room, I was actually quite happy with my situation. Sure, nothing had really changed - I was high on morphine, my dad and I were stuck in hospital for the duration of Father's Day, and something was playing hockey in my intestines. But I had a peace and a joy that comes exclusively with your choice of salvation or insanity. And it is a fine, though rare, occasion when one has the pleasure of passing GO and collecting both.

As it turned out, I had a kidney stone (and depending on when you read this, I may still have it). There was another man in the waiting room when we first arrived who had the same problem. He was crying and vomiting and walking around the busy room arduously. Apparently it was too agonizing for him to sit down... and he was in a great deal more pain than I was at the moment. I couldn't help but wonder - if I was standing, would I have even felt this thing in the first place? But I guess that's just one of those questions I'll have to ask Jesus when I get to Heaven... That one and, "What the heck did Devin and I eat at that picnic to cause this kerfuffle, anyway?!"