PISSING BLOOD

     One morning at school in the fourth grade I ate an entire red crayon.  It wasn't all that good.  I examined the texture of wax and the art of shaving a bit of crayon with my teeth until the crayon was gone.   Later that afternoon while many of my classmates ran through the boys lavatory between classes I amazed myself and some of my friends by pissing red.

     "Hey look guys!   I can piss red!"   I took a shot at the likely explanation, "All you have to do is eat a crayon and you pee that color."   Then I ran to the next class or recess.

     That night I got so sick I hardly dared to move.

     I could not climb into my top bunk.  My mother brought me into her bed and I laid out unmoving like fresh kill.  If someone sat on the side of the bed I could feel pain as intense as a kick to my testicles.  It was an organ pain, deep in my abdomen.  The sitter would jump up in alarm at my gasp and the bed would level and after a long minutes the pain would subside.  Even as a child I knew that I had seriously injured myself.

     I am a bit foggy about the time at this point.  Did my mother take me to the doctor that evening?   Did she take me the next morning?  How does this relate to lying on the bed like a hot mummy?

     I do remember the doctor's visit.   He had no answers beyond "Keep him still until he recovers."  That would be two or three days; a long time when you're nine.

     I remember a nurse who had a few moments alone with me at the doctor's office.  I cannot remember her face and I don't believe I ever knew her name, but she was quite concerned about me.   She whispered to me, "Honey, don't push so hard when you poop."

     I knew she was wrong, but I will love her forever for her caring and her attempt at talking sense to me where both my mother and the doctor were baffled.  From this experience I learned that Mom would do the right thing, that doctors just do the best they can but are fallible or don't ask the right questions, and that nurses can really care and would advise behind a doctor's back.

     I think that lesson, at nine years old, fathered my doubts about purely western medicine.

     I also learned that although crayons are non-toxic, wax is impossible to digest and can mechanically, or is it chemically?, put blood-letting stress on your internals.