A few things first
1.
I know I haven’t put anything on this blog for a
long time, and I don’t care.
2.
This is probably poorly written because I haven’t
written a thing since last year.
3.
If you get bored or offended, just don’t read it
and leave a comment like ‘nice story Matt, get well’.
On a foggy morning in July I woke
up early to prepare for the inevitable rain storm that seems to happen every
day during this season. Excited that it was the last day before my 2 month summer
holiday, the weather could no longer keep me down. My shoes and backpack were
still wet from the day before, but since I change when I get to school, I have
no problem smelling bad on the way there. I heated up some leftover miso from
the day before and had a bowl of rice with it. In my tatami room I ironed my
favorite shirt on the old damp piece of cardboard I have been using as an
ironing board since I started this job nearly a year ago. Folding it carefully and
sliding it into the tattered Uniclo sack to keep it from getting wet, it got
shoved into my musty backpack with the rest of the clothes for the day, my rain
suit, a stick of Old Spice and a 3 kilo U-lock. Leaving the house in a bit of a
rush, as I do every day, I threw on my old leather gloves that appear to have
been chewed up by some animal due to overuse, carried my fruitfly infested
garbage and my bike out the door and was on my way.
The rain from the day before and
the mist created a kind of humidity unimaginable to people that don’t live on a
coast or underwater. It feels almost as if you were breathing through a piece
of moss. After about 3 minutes of biking, I was covered in sweat. I could smell
the garage band heavy metal shirt I was wearing turn from fabric softener ‘spring
breeze’ to its usual pungent odder, which fits much better with the iron-on
picture of a blue pterodactyl ripping
through the bloody script of the band’s name. Stopped at both train tracks, I pedaled
faster, as if the extra speed would somehow get me to my destination faster,
even with the jungle of streetlights on the way. Crossing the Kiso River always
feels like an accomplishment. The bridge is always overloaded with cars and
trucks, catapulting me to the head of the jam. On the other side I’m usually
stopped by the light, but today was different.
Through the light and down the low
gradient hill I went, traffic seemed to slow, but the bicycle was just moving
faster. The next light came, green as well, but something else came with it. A
small silver SUV, moving quickly to avoid oncoming traffic, turned to my surprise.
Before I could touch the brakes I heard the crunch of her fender and wheel well
against my favorite mode of transportation. My brain slowed everything down,
which must be some kind of joke your nervous system plays on you, milliseconds
before you’re in excruciating pain. I saw the sky and a flash of silver before
smashing the sandy damp tar road. The only word that came out of my mouth
though was FUCK! And it came out loud, many times. Even in pain, I looked at my
bloody arm and thought about how cool it was going to look with a scar. A
frantic woman came rushing to me and she had the same reaction but with a
different word. Daijoubu?!?!? I remember the expression on the man’s face
across the street, even after my glasses had been blown off my head. An old man
came up and commented on how slow the police were at getting to accidents. In
blood soaked shorts, I sat in the road waiting for something.
They came and helped me to my
feet, and dragged me to the gravel pulloff next to the signal post. I checked
out my bike, but didn’t see anything wrong with it. The police started
questioning me as everything started to iris-out, resembling the end of a
Looney Toons episode. I became sick and pulled myself out of the darkness, but
didn’t lose the miso. The ambulance was there in an instant. They put me in a
neckbrace and threw me on a stretcher. I felt like I must have blacked out on
the way to the hospital, because it seemed to take no time to get there.
Quickly wheeling me into the ER,
moving me from one cold metal table to another, the doctors took x-rays and ran
tests, in the kind of rush you’d see in the back of the house at a busy restaurant.
Questioning me in Japanese, I spit out answers the best I could with what must
have been a painful looking smile on my face.
After the tests, they wheeled me
into some sort of waiting room where the driver of the car greeted me with the
most sincere guilt ever sent in my direction. It turns out she works for the
hospital, which was actually a 3 minute walk from where pieces of my bicycle
and skin remain. She sat with me for the next 6 hours and tried her best to
keep me company. I tried my best to answer her questions in retarded Japanese.
A member of my company came and helped me fill out forms. The ER doctor came in
and told me nothing was broken and I could go home in a few hours. He showed me
a pink picture of my spine, and I threw him a thumbs up. A nurse came in with a
pair of crutches and I sat up. My vision once again faded and I almost passed
out. They said it was normal since I had been lying down for so long. I stood
up and almost passed out again, but this time from the pain. They had me lie
down once more. Another doctor came in and suggested I stay at the hospital a
bit longer to run some tests. How could I refuse?
Back up
to the x-ray room, they painfully slid me from the soft bed on wheels to a cold
metal table. Pretending to understand what the technicians were saying, I continued
with what I assumed was correct x-ray etiquette. Back to the bed and into the
hall I waited with my followers, which had grown from 2 to 4 in the last half
hour. The driver’s aunt and another employee from my job had joined my party.
With the new x-rays, they noticed a small crack in one of my lumbar vertebrae
and changed my reservation at the hospital from a few hours to a few days.
They rolled me to my new room
where I was questioned to fill out more hospital forms through the translation
of a higher up in my company. “How many times do…you know...poo…per day?” “Do
you…I don’t really know what this is in English…”. A Japanese man, who looked
like a special guest you might see at Mile-High-Sci-Fi-Con, walked in dressed
in blue scrubs. His face was young and chinless, perhaps the local Doogie
Howser. He told me he wanted to run a CT scan incase anything else was wrong.
Back to the cold table, into a mini stargate I went. The new scan showed two
cracked vertebra, a small crack on my upper pelvis and the outline of my
manhood. The stay at the hospital was extended to a week. Depression kicked in
realizing the loss of my summer vacation. I knew I would have to cancel the
tickets to Hong Kong and do something about my friend that was on her way for a
4 day visit from Tuesday. Sitting in my new room, I awkwardly chatted with my
guests, trying to keep my spirit up. They slowly disappeared until I was the
only person I knew in the room.
I got to know my new roommates without
speaking a word to them. There were 5 others. On my right was a quiet old man
who seemed to want nothing to do with the hospital or its staff. Across from
him was a hairless man in his 80s who spoke with a high pitched jolly sounding
voice that reminded me of the grandfather you always wanted. From there it went
downhill fast. To his right was a man that was barely alive. No teeth and mostly
bones, I never saw him move and the nurses came in sporadically to feed him
with a syringe full of white goo. The
only thing that proved he was still alive was the screams that came in 2 hour
intervals at night. The man to his right, next to the window, was a bit
younger, but used an adult sized walker without the toys attached to it. That
day, I heard a noise coming from his bed that sounded a bit rude, surprised that
a man would do such a thing in a room full of his peers, I later found out it
was only the sound of gum being chewed in the loudest manner possible. To my left
was the man that truly kept me from sleeping that night. He must have been senile
because instead of using the call button to fetch a nurse, he would just yell
out of the room. It would go like this about every hour at night: “NURSE!
NURSE!...NURSE!” “What is it?” “I don’t remember…Can I have some tea?” The
nurses would come at midnight to change dippers, which prompted me to breathe through
my pho-buckwheat husk pillow. The new diagnosis came that night as well. With
my first set of close friends to visit, Dr. Howser walked in and explained to
me that it would be best if I stayed there for 4 weeks and “we’ll see after
that”. I think that news will still take a while to sink in. Someone mentioned
it was Friday the 13th.
Saturday came along with a few more
trips to the CT scanner to triple check everything. My doctor came in and told
me what I understood as this “japanesejapanesejapanese…etone…abdominopelvic
cavity…japanesejapanese.” I was like “ok”. I mentioned to the nurse that the
room was noisy, so they rolled my bed to the other side of the hall. My new
roommates were instantly more satisfactory, along with a window view from the 6th
floor. Across from me was a friendly 86 year old Japanese Christopher Walken
who I could barely understand, but he liked to chat. Next to him was a man with
a neck brace who was completely silent day and night except for when his wife
came to visit, and only then spoke in whispers. To his left was a 40 year old who
broke his foot in a fishing accident. On my right was a young man who came into
the hospital the same time I did. He broke his leg in a scooter accident.
Obviously part of underbelly Japan, he always wore black t-shirts with cursive
script that say things like Killer Juice Mafia or something totally incomprehensible.
His friends all talked in a way I could hardly understand and had blonde
mullets. They must have been part of the bozosozosoku.
The woman who hit me came with a
box of cakes to share with my other visitors. I spent most of the day watching
movies and reading from the Kendal that Dan left for me. Some more friends came
later that day, one of whom passed out at the sight of my pain moving from the
bed to the wheelchair. It was the most flattering thing a friend could do for
me, and I want to know why no one else has passed out. They suggested that I
move to a hospital closer to Nagoya city for easier access, and we got the ball
rolling. There was little noise that night, but since I was only able to sleep
on my left side, I could still only nap.
To my surprise, Sunday came and
went quickly. I spent most of the day chatting up the nurses and typing to my
parents. A call came from my old boss in Nagoya and within 2 hours he was at
the hospital with his family. One of the teachers from my current Junior High
School stopped by for a surprise visit. Most of the day was uneventful except
for watching the pilot of Twin Peaks, Pulp Fiction, and the 1977 Japanese horror/awesome
movie House. After dinner (at 6), they moved the young guy next to me out and
replaced him with another super old guy. Every time he exhaled, sounds of pain
came out of his mouth. That night, he and the man in the neck brace had a
conversation that only I knew was taking place. Neck brace would whisper in his
sleep “wakanaikoshimus…” and old man pain would retort “AAAAhhherrrrshimofukenerrr”.
It made me laugh, regrettably.
On Monday I sneezed, and it was truly more painful than
being hit by a car. I talked to Christopher Walken about mountain climbing…I
think…and made the nurses laugh with my poor Japanese. A lot of friends came
later in the afternoon and they helped me figure out what I need to do. We
tried tracking down my bicycle, but we were unsuccessful. Later that night I
got a call from the woman who hit me and found out she has my bike with her,
but she said it’s totaled.
