The Flippin' Moon

You know what?  If you don't laugh, you'll end up with more than one crack. You have to take situations and enjoy them for what they're worth.  This post is being half dictated by Rachel to Kristen.  Kristen is "butt"ing into this story to make sure that it stays decent enough for innocent eyes.  But it really is a crack up.

First of all, you have to understand what a seizure is like—or a convulsion or whatever these things are that have been Rachel's exercise regime for the last week.  These things are hard to describe because they are a complete split between the mind and the body.  The mind takes a vacation—while the body explores new shapes, evidently considering a possible career as a contortionist.  In doing this, it burns up approximately the same number of calories that it costs an athlete to run a marathon.  When you're done with it, you feel like your muscles are ripped to shreds.  Certainly, your dignity gets pretty shredded.

They come on kind of like tornados.  First there's nothing, then there's everything, then there's really nothing.  And while Rachel's mind is, actually, somewhat conscious of what's going on, or at least, it thinks it is, it has no say whatsoever in what the hands, arms, chin neck, stomach, legs decide to do.  And they are all deciding on their own.  Independently.  Emphatically.

At first, all this was pretty scary.  But you kind of get used to it, and you begin to think about what all this probably looks like from the outside.  And all of a sudden, you start to see the humor in it.  (Kristen's note: dark humor.)  So as Rachel became a pro over the days, while she was jerking around on the outside (not being a jerk), she was actually giggling on the inside.

When you couple this with the elegant indignity of the backless gown—well—it can get awkward.  Especially when you are in the quick response room, which is situated directly across from the nurse's station so that they can see straight into it at all times.  And the bed is arranged so that your head is in the far corner of the room, while your feet are presented to the world.

During one interesting episode (out of so many), instead of just doing the pretzel thing, Rachel's feet decided to head north.  Which kind of posed a big problem.  With her pose.  At least from the south end—at which were the hall (where anybody can walk by) and the nurse's desk (where people are actually keeping watch) (and eating lunch).

"Dang," Rachel would have thought, if she had been thinking—because it seemed to her that the moon must be rising, early.  It was unbearable.  Oh, wait—unfortunately, it was VERY bare able.  For days, Rachel got a big kick out of having exposed herself to the world (one of her great ambitions) until her mom ruined it by informing her that OF COURSE she had been completely modest, draped, guarded by the angel mother who has spent days leaping around the bed, pulling blankets back down—just in time.

Her mother also points out gratefully that Rachel's arm and hand, which have decided that convulsion time is actually pointing time—are actually point with the pointing finger and not some other, less socially acceptable finger, which could prove awkward.  As it might have been yesterday, when the pointing happened to be directed at a very awkward region of the body of a male nurse who was only trying to help at the time.  Rachel's mother would like everyone to understand that she did try to raise her daughter up as a lady.  Mooning and flipping were not on the agenda.  But we all know Rachel, and how futile her efforts actually were.