sweetheart redux

Some of you are familiar with my old punk rock war story of me getting jumped by a bunch of skinheads and krusty punx after my first band's first gig.  I was 16, and as a teenager I was overflowing with creative energy and also a sense of everything still being new; even when something was awful, it was an intriguing new experience I wanted to examine with a feverish intensity.  So I wrote and wrote and wrote about the attack.  I did a zine regularly for years and at least 3 issues of it are practically exclusively prose and lyrics, and comics, and clip art, relating to my experience of being attacked. Other than that particular life-changing experience, though,  I tend not to record the big events in my life.  I didn't really write in any diary, fiction or essay format about living in my first roommate-free apartment, or my first heart surgery, my wedding, the birth of my son, my second heart surgery, the month or so I spent of rehab with family in Flor...

I go to the ER sort of a lot.  I used to work with this woman, Rosalba, who also went to the ER a lot -- she said she once went two times in one week, one particularly bad week in which she had abdominal pain on Tuesday and fell and broke her tail bone on Friday.  We were both so embarrassed for ourselves (but kind to each other) at being that type of person.  It was surprising to me that she'd ever feel embarrassed by anything.  She was so charming it was probably a pleasure to take her blood pressure. I have a good friend who also goes a lot, as the method of being admitted to the hospital for her condition.  I just finished reading a biography about Edie Sedgewick, who actually seemed to like Emergency Rooms, hospitals and damaging procedures performed on her under the guise of masculine professional help.  I think Sedgewick was into it for the pills, but also, maybe, the comfort of knowing you're being watched over, even if it's only by strangers. W...