A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste

There is a difference between raising a boy and raising a girl.  And I don’t just mean around the toilet; I mean the very things that they do are different.

For example, girls like to play games like “House” or “Hopscotch” or “Jump Rope.”  These are all fairly sedate games, and rarely lead to any kind of trauma.

Boys like games that involve knives, fire, or blood.  Particularly all three, if it can be arranged.

Last week, the boy was at school playing a game called “Wolf Pack.”  The rules of the game are somewhat sketchy, but they seem to be that there are packs of kids that roam around and occasionally savage each other.  If that sounds like some kind of latter-day playground horror movie dystopia, then I think you have the general gist of it.

They’re playing the game last week when William gets into it with “Alpha Wolf.”  Or rather, I guess he was in a tussle with “Beta Wolf” since Alpha Wolf told somebody to…oh, heck, it doesn’t matter.  Here’s kind of what happened:

There was a tussle.  Other Boy (we’ll call him) is shaking William, and then throws him to the ground.  William doesn’t get up, so Other Boy prods him with a toe and discovers that William is unconscious.  At that point the bell rings, and he has to go in, leaving behind his unconscious friend (these two swear they’re friends, even after the event).

Imagine the scene from A Christmas Story:  “The bell rang!”  So they just leave him behind.

Luckily a teacher is strolling by, and sees William groggily staggering around.  “Are you okay?” she asks.

“Peanut butter hot dog GET OFF MY LAWN!” he rants.  “Yes, we have no bananas.”  Then he peers up at her.  “Destiny is calling.  Will you accept the charges?”

She decides, wisely, that he perhaps needs to see the nurse.  Escorting him there, the nurse examines him and discovers that he’s a little woozy.  So she calls Angela to come and pick him up. 

“COMMIES!” he yells when his mother arrives.  “THERE ARE BUGS IN MY NOSTRILS!”

Well, as you can imagine, we’re all concerned, so they call in Other Boy for an interrogation.  I originally imagined that this scene involved hot lights and veiled threats and perhaps even threatened waterboarding, until I heard that the following phrase got used:

“Now, this is a safe place, and whatever you say is okay, and you can’t get in any trouble.  Please just tell me what you think happened.”

When did I start sending my kids to hippie school?  Back in my day, the principal blew cigar smoke in your face, and said things like “Our janitorial staff is all here on prison release and they have keys to the furnace.  You get me, punk?”

But I digress.  So anyways, he repeats the story about the incident, and by this point William is coherent enough to confirm that, yes, he does think that may be what happened.  And they’re both good friends.  But he would like to go home, since he’s feeling rather woozy.

The nurse administers the Brain Too Damaged to Leave test, which involves lots of numbers and counting and backwards spelling (but if you backwards spell on a drunk test, you can count on a DUI).  He passes with flying colors, and he comes home, and although he’s a little tired by that night he seems okay and then turns in and it’s all okay.

Then it gets weird.

His sister gets ahold of the sheet from the school that says “So you may have had a concussion” and reads it for signs and symptoms.  Then she starts in on me.

“Daddy,” she says.  “I notice that William’s eyes seemed less dilated than usual.  I also noticed that he seemed to slur some words, and be fuzzy, and have trouble with his balance.  And his breathing seems stressed.  I believe he has a massive concussion and needs to have an MRI immediately.”

“Bosh,” I said.  “Go away.”

“But dad!  He could be seriously brain damaged!”

“Go away!” I said.

“What if he slips into a coma? What if he dies?  How will you feel then?”

“VICTORIA I’M IN THE BATHROOM!” I yelled.  “GO AWAY!”

“Fine,” she said.  “But if he gets worse I’ll never forgive you.”

The next day he seems okay, so we just kept watching him and went on with our lives.  And then he got weird.

On Saturday we decided to go to see a movie, Escape from Planet Earth.  As we’re waiting for the movie to start, he leans over and says this: 

“Hey, dad, what’s my real name?”

“William Hollis,” I said.

“No, my real name.”

“William Hollis,” I said.  “What did you think it was?”

“That’s not my name,” he said.  “I mean what name was I born with?”

This is a strange question on many levels.  “That’s the only name you’ve ever had,” I said.

“No, it isn’t,” he insisted.  “I know I have a different name.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because you said William Hollis, but you didn’t say Allen, so I was clearly born with another name.  A-ha!  You don’t have an answer for that, do you, you commie?”

Let me make this clear: I’m summarizing here.  This went on for TWENTY MINUTES!  It was like a bad Abbott and Costello routine crossed with some horrible ABC movie of the week where a girl sees her face on the milk carton.  Finally we promised to show him his birth certificate when we got home, whereupon he turned into a truther.

“I asked for that a long time ago and you never showed me!” he insisted.  “You’re hiding something from me.  WHAT IS IT?  COMMIES!”

He finally settled down, though, and the movie started.  Everybody but me liked it.  I hated it, but that’s only because it was bad and it stunk, and since I write these my opinion is the only one that counts.

When we got home, his mother showed him his birth certificate (note: if you ever accuse your birth mother of not actually bearing you, she gets a little ticked off) and he finally accepts that, yes, perhaps his only name is William Hollis. 

That night, at bedtime, his sister started working him again.  “Don’t you have headaches?” she asked.  “Nausea?  Vision problems?  Are you having out-of-cycle menstruation with heavier-than-normal cramps?”

“What?” he asked as he brushed his teeth.  “What are you talking about?”

“You need to get checked out,” Victoria said.  “Maybe an MRI, a CAT scan, and probably get a bone marrow sample just to be on the safe side.”

“I am feeling a little bad,” he said.

“That’s what happens!” she told him.  “You feel fine, and then, BAM!  You just keel over from concussionitis.”

“Stop winding him up!” I insisted.  “You’re only making things worse!”

“Why don’t you love your son?” she asked.

“COMMIES!” he yelled for no apparent reason.  “THERE ARE DUCKS IN MY EYEBALLS!”

At that point, we began to suspect that he did need to see a doctor. And when he also admitted that he’d been having flash migraines, his mother made an appointment to see his pediatrician.  That visit was on Monday, and she confirmed that, yes, his symptoms were certainly post-concussion syndrome (which I didn’t even know existed).  It can last for 1 to 6 weeks, and there’s not really anything to do but keep him rested and keep him out of gym and physical activities.

Here’s the upside of post-concussion syndrome: the conversations are fantastic.  As long as he’s not worried about the communists spying on him from inside the dryer, he’s usually a hoot (like when he was mooning me from the bathroom “because you like astronomy.”). 

Here’s the downside: vomiting and mood swings.  Now, the vomiting is okay, because it happened somewhere else while I was around.  But the mood swings can be a pill, like when he goes from happy to “DIE COMMIE SCUMBAG!” in about ten seconds. 

You’re probably worried now and thinking I’ve been making light of his condition, but never fear: he’s pretty much back to normal as of now, ten days after the event.  He only puked once, and again, not when I was around, so that’s okay.  And he’s been his normal chipper self all day, and was only punch-drunk twice in the evening.

Now, if he’ll just accept that his deodorant isn’t filled with mind-control chemicals and start using it again, I’ll be happy.