The FYC

I’d tell you about my NYE night, but the fact of the matter is you don’t care and I can’t remember much of it anyway. There were some Irish car bombs, then some flippy cup, and then I fell down a bunch. Final memory of the evening: Lying on one of my neighbor’s lawn at 2am after I had just walked into a parked car, screaming at nothing in particular. I woke up in the morning with a half empty plate of pizza, an unfinished glass of wine, and a dislocated left thumb. “Hangin’ in a chow line... Good times.”

(Wow... I just reread that paragraph, and... um... I’m engaged? How in the hell did that happen?)

Anyway, yesterday The Lady Friend’s brother had a seizure. He has epilepsy, so it’s happened before and wasn’t exactly the most surprising of things; regardless, it’s still a rather scary moment. Seizures in general tend to freak me the fuck out. The fact that the wiring in your body can get all crossed up and cause you to (essentially) short-circuit, is one of those things that it’s better for me to not think about, because if I try to wrap my head around the idea, my head will literally explode (other things I don’t think about for the same reason include: The size of the universe, the thought that after death there is nothing, Fraggle Rock in general, and how the Banks kids never noticed that their mom was a totally different person all of a sudden on “The Fresh Prince”).

I’ve only been up close and personal to someone having a seizure once before. And since I’m bored and you probably are, too (why else would you be reading this?), I’m going to tell youse about it.

It was early in the fall of 2003; I was out in North Carolina, simply biding my final nine months in the Marines, literally counting down the days I had left every morning when I awoke. On one such morning, we (my platoon) had what we called “PT” [for “Physical Training”, because just fucking calling it “working out” or “going for a jog” didn’t sound “military” (read: douchey) enough.]

Before we set off on our run -- and if I recall correctly, we were scheduled to go for about four miles that day [I only remember because I despised running any further than three miles (I don’t even like to drive that far, let alone run) and would do just about anything to get out of having to run that far (as opposed to now, when I won’t run over, say, two city blocks)], so I was already being one groggy, cranky son of a bitch -- everyone gathered into a giant circle, with longtime friend of the show Evelio leading us in stretches (because as we all know, everybody stretches out in the same manner, be them 19 or 40, so uniform stretching is easily the most effective way for everyone to be ready for a run).

We went through our ten minutes of coordinated, bullshit stretches and Evelio told us to stretch out on our own for a few minutes. A few moments later, I noticed the dude to my right, an odd fella named Murphy, had begun staring at the sun and walking around in tiny circles.

Now, to know Murphy was to know weirdness personified. He was in his young twenties, spent most of his time in a bath robe, really, really liked “The Matrix,” and was being let out of the Marines for being (oh, how do I put this nicely?) “batshit fucking insane.”

So when the Murph started walking around in little circles and staring at the sun, everyone just thought to themselves “There goes crazzzzzzy ‘ol Murphy… Being all crazzzzzy again!” (If you want to get a more realistic feel for the way we said it, say it to yourself in your best Professor Frink voice, and do so while performing jazz hands.)

Then he started making some weird, gurgling noise. “Huh?” everyone thought aloud.

Then he fell to the grass and started convulsing.

Still, no one knew what the hell was going on. In fact, the first statement put into words when Murphy started seizing was by Evelio who said “Ha… That’s a funny stretch.”

(And, yes, that was the exact second that Evelio punched his ticket to hell.)

After what felt like at least ten minutes, but more realistically was at the most five seconds, I finally spoke up and said “Ummm... I think he’s having a seizure.” This was met by twenty sets of eyes; all staring back at me, not knowing what the hell was going on. “Well... then... I guess I’ll go call an ambulance,” I said to the crowd of stunned dumbasses before running into our barracks and calling the paramedics.

While we were waiting for the paramedics to arrive, most of the rest of the platoon left for their run (someone tried to tell me to go too, but I counteracted them by saying that if something else bad happened, these brain morons would apparently need me around to dial “9-1-1”) and I started thinking about what in the hell seizures really were.

After about three seconds of thinking about it, I stopped. Too weird and too big for me to grasp, it’s better if I don’t bother. All I need to know is that they’re scary as all hell.

Although, once, they did get me out of having to run four miles.

And that’s my boring story for the day. You’re welcome.

[As an addendum, I always assumed that Evelio’s “Ha... That’s a funny stretch” would be the most offensive line I would hear while someone was having a seizure. But then, about two months later, Murphy started having another seizure, this time directly in front of my room. My roommate Will and I were lying in bed (not together. We had bunks!) when our neighbor Billy flung our door open and said “Murph’s having a seizure!”

To which Will replied, “Well. Shut the damn door, then.”

And then we went back to bed.

(Not together.)]