MRI Monstrosity
Seven CLICKs. Seven WHOMBs. Seven CLICKs. Seven WHOMBs. A rhythm so steady that if my body weren’t throbbing from the deafening decibels, I could have fallen asleep in that worn chair against the wall.
There was no time in that large room made small by the white plastic-coated cube squatting in its center. Boxes and various medical machinery were strewn on tables with wheels–not messy, but not the imagined white sterile death of a hospital either. Actually, when one stops listening to the WHOMBs, they might notice the pretty pale blue of the walls and the sports magazine that another patient waiter had brought in before them. Patient, the adjective; waiter, not of tables. Perhaps, you think to yourself, that I’m being redundant, since patience should be a natural virtue of the waiter, but it’s not so.
Not in this room.
In this room, sitting beneath a small, black camera lens that records your loved one’s movements as they’re strapped down and inserted into a cubical vagina that zaps them with magnetic fields so strong that even a sliver of metal in its vicinity is considered hazardous, patience is only one step away from psychosis.
Did I mention that there’s no time? Only an unpatterned (and blurry, in my case, since I was instructed to remove my glasses) countdown of red numbers on the cube that marked the duration of each scan. Perhaps a person who’s quick with numbers could add the minutes and know how long they had been sitting there. But I didn’t have my Palm on me, so all I could do was hum “As the Deer” over and over in my head to reassure myself that time was passing.
I fidgeted with the yellow earplugs that the technician had given me and wondered if Sis was having the same problem with them. What if one had fallen out, and she was trapped in that narrow hole, two WHOMBs away from losing hearing in her left ear but unable to call out or move her arms? I stared at her knees, propped up and covered with a coarse white hospital blanket, and decided, five CLICKs later, that she was okay since she hadn’t so much as twitched. Unable to control the writer in me, an absurd metaphor revealed itself. She is the earplug of the MRI machine. I’m not skilled enough to do anything with that just yet.
I wondered if the camera lens above my head would alert the technician immediately in case Sis had a seizure and kicked her legs. Was there a camera in the hole, so that he could see her actual face and not just the technicolor of her brain on black screens? How wide was that lens? Would the technician see me if I snuck over to the box by the door and pocketed a few ear plugs? Probably. Better not risk it.
Time to read about Lebron James and the NCAA picks. Go Bruins! Not that I care. But my brain could no longer hear itself over the muffled wails of the machine, so humming “As the Deer” had become frustrating since I was forced to start over mid-stanza after getting distracted by a random WHIZZ.
James better stats than Kobe. Okay. Turn page. New Jersey Nets going strong. Nice. Turn page. Los Angeles Clippers. Always the underdog. Turn page. Charlotte Bobcats. Who?
Silence crept in while I flipped through the magazine.
Colors flitted by my peripheral and I glanced up to see the technician pulling my sister out. He smiled at me and spoke words that I didn’t hear.
Rather dazed, I asked, “Are we done?”
The earplugs distorted all sound, and I don’t know if my voice came out or not. I pulled one out in time to hear him answer, “No, just giving her a shot.”
“Ah,” I said.
Daaaamnnnnnnnnn, I thought.
I hustled to Sis’s side, holding her left hand as the tech injected her right arm with some fluid that is meant to enhance the images. She smiled and squeezed her eyes shut at the prick.
“How much longer?” I said.
“Just five minutes,” he said.
That means nothing to me, I thought.
Back into the hole she went. Back out the room the tech went. Back to my chair I went.
Do I really care about this college basketball player? NYU sucked. Never a team worth mentioning. Pages 54-56 are torn out. Top online poker sites. Hmph. Everyone thinks they can win the World Series of Poker nowadays.
The door opened.
“Done.”
Sis and I shuffled out of the room, both groggy from the lack of noise and from not moving for so long. I pulled our dangerous metallic hair clips and jewelry out of the temporary locker and checked my cell phone.
“Hey, it’s only 5:30! So much time to kill before dinner!”
Glimpses of the Past
There’s one picture at some family banquet where Dad’s mouth is covered in crab bits. I laughed and scolded him and handed him a napkin. He wiped his mouth, missed a few spots, and tried to give me more crab, ignoring the fact that I don’t enjoy eating crab. I told him he still had some on the corner of his mouth, and he looked at me with insanely innocent eyes (I mean, he’s in his 50s, how can he still look innocent?) and wiped at the wrong spot. I shook my head and told Mom to wipe Dad’s mouth.
At least… that’s what would have happened if I had been there nine years ago. But I wasn’t. So I can only imagine.
*sigh*
Being in two-thirds of the pictures just isn’t enough. All of them wouldn’t be enough. The two boxes full that I have under my end table aren’t enough. I can’t hear him or touch him through the pictures. I don’t know what he’s thinking at the moment that picture was taken. I don’t know what he’s saying or why he’s laughing. It’s not enough. All the pictures in the world aren’t enough. They can’t make him alive and tangible.
But it’s what little I have and I am happy that I have that much.
Here’s Dad looking dapper in his teens. He’s a hottie, if I do say so myself. And yeah, the other family members…
This picture below is all Dad. He’s got a standing swagger, he’s natural, casual, and it almost looks like ego, but it isn’t. He’s just hanging out. He was like that with everyone. I imagine if he had ever met our President or Charles Bronson (Dad’s all-time favorite actor), he’d be just as casual.
From left to right: Dad, my cousin (I think), Dad’s oldest brother, Dad’s youngest sister, Dad’s second oldest sister, some guy who’s probably also my cousin
God of War II Launch Party
This party was the most fun of all the office parties I’ve been to. I attribute that to everyone knowing everyone else better and everyone being relaxed because the game is finally done and doing really well. They’ve sold 425,000 units the first week, which is huge! I remember at the God of War (I) launch, the number was only at 120,000 or so, and at that time, everyone was excited about that. So, quadruple that? It’s great. And I’ve been playing the final released version (on easy mode because I’m a pussy) and it is really a great game. I think it’s more polished than the first one, which is a testament because most sequels (in nearly anything that involves sequels) are often not up to par with the original. My personal gripe is that there is too much flying and timing. But that’s mostly because I’m really shitty with well… flying and timing. But it’s an awesome game, play it!
The party was at the Key Club on Sunset Boulevard. It was really nice and intimate, for a club. They had screens of all sizes all over the place, playing the GOW footage, so that was pretty neat. The food was decent, nothing too weird. Drinks a plenty. And happy people. It was nice.
Here are the pics I took. Most are blurry, many are dark. It’s because I don’t know how to do manual exposure, and the flash was TOO bright, and no flash was too dark. Oh well. And no, I wasn’t drunk. I only had four and a half vodka tonics. Trust me, that’s NOTHING compared to what T sucked down. Oh, I also didn’t sort them or anything. So if you’re wondering who’s who, you’ll either have to ask me, or just move on to the next pic.
