[our neighborhood Buddhist temple - just off the woods]

So where was it I left off?…Heading to the ER, right?

Well, the long & short of it is I got there. I had been expecting to have to wait a few hours – it was Sunday night, there were bound to be Privates with busted knuckles or babies with snotty noses. So I had shoved every conceivable time-passing distraction into my purse: iPod, my latest book, my day planner and a wrap to keep warm - I always freeze to death in ER’s.

So it turned out I was wrong. I lugged 5 lbs. of crap all the way up to Yongsan for nothing. I was the only patient to be seen & they shuffled me into the receiving room.

You know the drill: ID, blood pressure, temperature, ‘are you in any pain right now?’, etc.

But the Korean man working the receiving room was too busy typing what appeared to be the same irrelevant English sentence into a Word document over & over. Didn’t turn his head to look at me once. In fact, I don’t think he looked up at me at all.

About two minutes later the attending nurse shuffled in – very sweet & obviously very accustomed to his Korean manners. So very gently she began asking me all the questions, ‘what did you come in for’, etc. And then she proceeded to ask this can’t-be-bothered man if it was alright for her to go ahead & take me back and run the vitals herself. She actually had to ask the man 3 times before a solitary grunt could be heard.

She hooked me up & I began to tell the stupid tale of how I decided to get into a head-butting contest with the car…and lost. At this point the blood pressure machine finished & began squealing something fierce: it read 179/110. (The high end of normal is 120/80 – but you know me, I’m an over-achiever.)

The ER Doc (and I use that term loosely – I think he was 12) came in about then & I got to tell the whole tale over again. I should’ve just printed out cards to hand out.

He was about ready to dismiss everything I said until I mentioned that the only reason I came up to 121 was because the hospital already had my brain scans on file. Well, that woke him up a bit. He excused himself to review the files & a few minutes later came back to say he had consulted with my Neurologist. And since none of my lesions are vascular (meaning no blood) they felt fairly positive that I wasn’t in jeopardy of a brain bleed.

He started to order a pain cocktail IV when I stopped him.

“Is this the same IV as the migraine cocktail?”, I asked.

Well yes – turned out it was. So I turned it down. Unforutnately those don’t work on me. I looked the boy in the eye & said, “save your meds”. He was a little taken back – wanting to “help my pain” – but I explained I’ve been down that road & they’ve yet to find anything that works. Not even the hospital grade stuff. Besides, now I had to hop my embarrassed butt back home & it would probably be better if I was coherent enough to do that.

So yeah…that’s my whole super-exciting, bone-chilling, thrill-ride-a-minute tale of how I hit my head.

I was positive they’d keep me overnight, but they didn’t. So needless to say, calling Eric to tell him, “I’m heading back home on the 7:30 bus” was more than a bit humbling. All I could think was – great, now the man will never believe me the next time I get hurt.

But I made it home…with a sheet on “Understanding Concussive Syndrome” & how to expect my symptoms to stay around for a few days. Which they did.

I will say this…it was the first time I could actually tell the difference in pain between my usual headaches & just what a regular ol’ headache is supposed to feel like.

But three days later that plain ol’ headache was gone…only to be replaced with my old stand-by pain.

Tomorrow I hop the bus to Yongsan yet again. This time for my 3rd MRI.

A little nervous. I’ll admit it.

Out of the past 20 days I’ve had a headache 14 of them. They’re not as bad as last February…I don’t think. At least they’re not constant. But they’re there. Same low, burning, piercing pain right over my eye. Sometimes over the right; sometimes over the left.

So for now, good night. I’ve got to crawl in bed for I’m off to see the wizard & his whiz-bang machine again tomorrow.

[Random pics of Mr. Chong's slums - This is Red. He always smiles when he sees me.]

Why is it whenever I do have a accident it’s in the most absurd way possible? It’s never some exciting, blood-pumping, adrenalin-filled tale of daring adventure.

Nope.

It’s things like “the dog hit me“. Remember that lovely chestnut?

Well, this time around I have no one to blame but myself…ok, me and the car.

[But he's never too sure about Maggie]

It was early Sunday afternoon & I was a woman on a mission. I had a list; a list of things like – take out the trash, go to the commissary, check the mail room, hit the PX.

Since I only have the car on the weekends it means I have to pile everything I need to do up & knock it out all in one big run. And it usually takes up a good half the day – a quarter of my weekend!

So as you can imagine, I tend to move a little fast hoping to beat my record time for most amount of chores done on any given Saturday, in this case Sunday.

[This is Momma-Dog. She couldn't care one way or the other.]

I snatched up the purse, grabbed the keys & made a bee-line for the car. Since I was also throwing away a few cardboard boxes, I went to open the trunk first.

This is where I get to say that we own a PT Cruiser. A lovely little car that navigates the Korean roads just fine & let me tell you, it’s amazing how much crap I can cram in that thing. Especially when we were moving from Virginia to Oklahoma. I can pack that sucker tight!

When the car was new & you wanted to lift the tail gate, all you had to do was open the latch. The hydraulics would automatically push the tail gate up to it’s full & upright position, so you didn’t have to give it a second thought.

[The chicken coop kittens think if they stand perfectly still I won't see them.]

But over the years it doesn’t really push itself up all the way anymore. Sometimes it will go three-quarters of the way, sometimes only half.

And this past Sunday it only went up half.

The problem with this is that while it was coming up halfway, I was coming down full-throttle.

*** Bang! ***

Massive smack to the head…right on the top of my head.

I didn’t knock me out. I didn’t swagger or stumble over my feet.

[Mercucio never pays attention - he's always stalking chickens. Why Mercucio?...no reason. Just a nod to Shakespeare.]

I think something along the lines of “FUDGE IT!” came out of my mouth. But other than the immediate throbbing that seemed to pass fairly quickly, I assumed I was just fine. An idiot, yes – but just fine.

I raced onto post, started off at the PX & roughly 30 minutes later at the commissary I noticed something was wrong.

It felt like I was falling forward on legs that seemed to either be drunk or moving through mud – maybe both. I dismissed it at first until the sensation just kept going.

[And then there's Kitler - surveying his domain while plotting government take-overs]

So I used what idiot brain-cell-skills I had left to finish the shopping & head home…walking in the door to tell Eric,

“Ok, this is where I need to tell you I’ve hit my head really hard.”

[blink...vacant stare...blink]

(Ok, well that didn’t work.)

Maybe it’s because I’m not the stereotypical hysterical woman. Maybe it’s because from all outward appearances I seemed perfectly fine. Maybe it’s because I seem to have an unusally high tolerance for pain.

No clue.

At this point there’s been no let up in the symptoms that first appeared in the commissary & I’m beginning to really worry. I sat down on the couch & weighed my options:

1. Take my happy butt to the TMC (troop medical center) which can really only handle bandaids or stitches, prescribing air & IV fluids instead of meds. Or…

2. Get Eric to drive me to the local Korean hospital (Good Morning Hospital – yeah, no joke on that one) & roll the dice that they would actually understand what I was saying.

The drawback to option 2 is that Koreans tend to have a habit of running every test, every diagnostic under the sun so that they can bill the good ol’ US of A for every penny. And if they did a brain scan….guess what they’d find?

[And last but not least, the heart-breaker Gorgeous Pup. Pup's actually on the far, far side of the slums although you can't tell because my camera's got rockin' zoom skills. So he can never really tell I'm talking to him. I so want to steal this dog.]

Yeah. That would only have them running more tests.

So it became apparent that my only legitimate option was to hop the bus to Yongsan, up to the 121 hospital where they already have all those lovely black & white images on file.

At this point it’s almost 3pm & it’s raining gang-busters. Driving to Seoul on the weekend is crazy enough, but add in rain?…ppfffhhhttt. Forget it. The bus would get me there quicker with less stress anyway.

So I had Eric take me to the on post bus station, dropped down my 6200 won for the 2 hour trip up there & then hopped a taxi over to the ER.

************

Since this story’s getting a little longer than I anticipated, I’m gonna stop here. Nobody likes to read that much at one time anyway. So I’ll pick-up again tomorrow.

Happy Friday!

Korea is called the Land of the Morning Calm. And there’s a saying here among the American rank, file & families…the Land of Not Quite Right.

That whole ‘close, but no cigar’ bit.

Trying to recreate the American experience, take the 4th of July for example, on foreign soil can never be quite right though.

It’s true. But it’s also true of any culture transplanted into another one.

Do you think your town could pull off an authentic German Ocktoberfest to impress a Berliner? Would you expect China to know how to throw a rodeo that would make a cowboy proud? Or Egypt to replicate your grandmother’s banana pudding?…Shoot – do you think Virginia Tex-Mex restaurants taste anything like real Tex-Mex? Or that I could make kimchi so delicious that the Lumber Barons would beg for the recipe?

I’ll give you a hint – NO!

Oh, everyone could get close (in varying degrees) but it wouldn’t be quite right.

And that’s the only way to describe our 4th of July this year – not quite right.

Homesickness is a powerful thing. Whether you’re stationed in South Carolina missing Arizona, or in South Korea missing Texas. It comes in cycles (as I’ve said before) and it can be the worst during American holidays.

It’s worse because, believe it or not, you have built-in expectations of what the holiday should look like, feel like, smell & taste like. And yes, every American’s expectations are slightly different – but when you boil it all down, I would bet you they’re all the same.

But back to the story at hand…

It was hot. Sticky hot. There were sticky hot melting people as far as the eye could see.

And as the sun went down & the evening show was about to start it finally began to cool a bit…and then things began to drift a little “not quite right”.

From out of the blue – with no announcement whatsoever, in English or Hangul thank-you-very-much - the Korean orchestra began playing the American national anthem.

Military personnel & families popped up left & right as we were all caught off guard…hurrying to stand at attention or put their hand over their hearts. While the Koreans sitting through out the field & bleachers remained in their seats, whispering to one another, wondering if they should stand up, too. It was awkward…for everyone.

But that’s when it hit me.

I was standing up…and they were sitting down.

There was just something about standing up to be counted among the Americans when standing on foreign soil.

And in that act of standing up I felt an overwhelming flood of emotion.

Home. I wanted to be home. I wanted to be home right now & I was umpteen thousand miles away. And as all those thoughts raced through my head I realized two things: no one was singing (granted, the guys can’t while at attention) & that the lack of voices made it seem so much more hollow.

And a tear or two rolled down my cheek. I tried to quickly wipe it away, but nope…Eric caught me.

[damn]

So here’s a hint for the guys: Sometimes us girls just want to shed a tear without it being seen…without it being pointed out. It’s usually because we know our emotions are getting the best of us & we don’t want to be caught looking silly – crying over the odd thing here or there.

So if you catch us…ok, ok, if you catch me…do me a favor. Don’t make a big deal of it. Don’t ask me to explain why there are tears rolling down my face. Just move on. The explaining is only going to make me cry more.

So he & I went through the whole exchange:

Eric: ‘Are you crying?’

Jenn: ‘No’

Eric: ‘Yes, you’re crying’

Jenn: ‘Ok, I’m crying’

Eric: ‘But why are you crying?’

[damn it]

Jenn: ‘I’m just homesick.’

Thankfully the traditional Korean music & drummers began to play & I didn’t have to continue explaining. I’ve already showed you clips of both groups. They were really great & they gave me a chance to redirect my thoughts away from home.

Shortly afterwards the General got up to say a few words & announce that due to an expected inbound storm they were going to have to change the rest of the night’s line up.

The orchestra would play the 1812 Overture first, the fireworks would follow(really wish it could’ve been timed together, but oh well) & afterwards the orchestra would continue with the rest of their scheduled performance.

I held my breath…yes, I know it’s silly. I haven’t heard the overture live in several years & this was the moment…the moment I was going to commit to memory to stave off homesickness.

And as I closed my eyes the strings began to play.

…da dum da dahhh dah-dah….da dah dah da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-dah dahhh dah dum…

[pictures of a neighborhood farm]

So back to the story of the gift.

I was getting what turned out to be a partial at-home-spa treatment for free!

I raced around cleaning the house of all the embarrassing left-out dishes, scattered dog toys & dining table junk. I didn’t want them walking in to see a messy house.

Which, off topic, why is it the house always get trashed over the weekend? During the week I’m on it, Baby. Sweeping, cleaning, dusting…I’m near fanatic about it. I have this vision that my tombstone is going to say ‘Here lies Jennifer. That girl could sweep.’

But by the time I got everything looking respectable they were at the door.

My friend, “Mary”, and the spa consultant?…spa expert?…spa practitioner?…I’m not exactly sure what her title is, but let’s call her “Kim”.

The first hurdle in our upcoming adventure was Moo.

One of Libby’s lasting legacieshas been to teach Moo to bark incessantly anytime someone’s at the door. Big…deep…booming…barks.

(The kind that make the Jehovah’s Witnesses think twice about ringing the doorbell.)

So I ordered Moo upstairs, welcomed them in, turned to get the baby gate to put up across the bottom of the stairs & in that split-second Moo started to make her way back down the steps.

In my haste to fuss at Mooch, get her to turn around & go back up, Kim ran into the bathroom to hide, crouching behind Mary who was her last line of defense against the monster living in our house.

I apologized profusely for the scare – Maggie hadn’t even made it halfway down the stairs. But it was enough to frighten her to death. Her’s was the typical Korean response…

“Oh! Oh! Oh!….[pointing]…Beeg dog!…Oh! Oh! Oh no!…[hand over gapping mouth]“

Lovely…hadn’t even got the girl into the living room yet. But things settled a bit & she proceeded to give me an initial consultation before working her magic bag of nickles.

Kim asked the questions in Hangul & Mary translated.

‘Where do you hurt?’….’How long has it hurt?’…’Do you have a lot of stress?’…on & on.

And as the questions were asked Kim began touching my shoulders, feeling my neck…trying to get an idea of how tense everything was. Which was immediately followed by a lively discussion in Hangul between Kim & Mary.

Apparently, I was in “bad shape”. So bad that my partial treatment became a full-on-body treatment. And before I knew it, I was stripped down to my panties, face down on the couch cushions laid out on the floor.

So you have to picture it – my big 5’7″ oversized Texas woman frame all spayed out surrounded by two little petite, perfectly proportionate delicate Korean women.

They began squirting the proprietary gel on my back & with hand-sized gadgets emitting an electrical pulse began systematically pushing the gel into my skin.

That would be the politically correct version.

The reality was that this little, petite Korean girl – all of 25 - might as well have had been pounding on my back with a bag of nickles.

It didn’t really hurt at first…but pound on something long enough & soon you’ll be hurting. I thought it would just be a quick 20, 30 minute rub-down. Afterall, I was getting this for free. But they kept going & kept going & kept going. And I started to worry a bit.

Eric wasn’t home yet – he had no idea I had people over, let alone I would be almost stark naked in the living room with two little Korean women rubbing me down with vibrating electrical devices. And before I knew it I heard…

“Ahh……hello, sexy wife.”

And for a moment, Eric thought he was the luckiest husband alive.

[images of the Lumber Baron's sunflowers]

Ok…so I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell this story now for a couple of days.

I’m in a tricky predicament & want to make sure I both honor, respect & truly convey how appreciative I am for the wonderful gift from my Korean friend earlier this week. But at the same time…it was an experience worth telling in all it’s outrageously funny glory.

So my friend (and you know who you are), if you’re reading this….please, please, please, please, please, PLLL-EASE don’t hate me. I can’t thank you enough for everything you did!

And you were right, the first few days I felt completely exhausted…but I was amazed to recognize how much better I feel today. And all of that is because of you.

So I hope you are able to read this in the spirit in which it’s written…out of great love, respect for our cultural differences and the laughter that those differences can bring.

[ahem]

Without further ado…ladies & now 3 gentlemen of the blog…I bring you the tale of…

= HOW I SURVIVED BEING BEATEN WITH A BAG OF NICKELS =

Monday was a car day for me. Meaning I dropped Eric off at work & I took the one car we share for the day. There was an errand I had to run (which is another story entirely). But in the process of running this errand, I ran into my friend – let’s call her “Mary”.

Mary has been very sick for the past couple of months. Like me, she was trying every doctor, every treatment available to her…and unfortunately, she too was getting the run around.

The doctors couldn’t pin-point what she had, what was making her sick in the first place or how to treat it. So they decided to “manage” the symptoms with medication.

The medication left her near comatose…walking around like a zombie when she was awake. She was exhausted, pale, droopy-eyed, slurring a bit and emotionally spent.

But when I ran into her Monday it was like night & day.

She looked GORGEOUS!

Beautiful clear, glowing, youthful skin – and she had NO make-up on. Her eyes were bright & alert. Her speech was excited & she was happy. Even a total stranger could tell how healthy & vibrant she looked.

She had found an alternative treatment for what ailed her…and for her…it had worked miracles. She was completely sold on it and rightly so.

In fact, she was so convinced on how great a treatment this was, that she immediately told me I needed to try it. Given all the headaches I’d been having earlier in the year…the lack of diagnosis for what’s ailing me…she thought this might help me, too.

So before I knew it she was scheduling time to come over to my house with the girl who treated her in order to give me a partial treatment – just my neck & shoulders – for free.

It was her gift to me…and I had no idea what I was getting into.

[part 2 tomorrow]