Call Al Sharpton: Iowahawk called me the "M" word

My pal Iowahawk may not have known it, but that mutha' fucka' did worse than call me the "N" word. He took it to the next level and called me the mutha' fuckin' "M" word!

Oh no he didnt!

Oh yes he did--  and i felt like beating his ass like Reginald Denny for saying that shit.  You can talk about my Mamma, but don't you dare call me the "M" word.....

You see, we hung out a bit in Texas recently at the Lonestar Roundup and it was a good time. After we got home, he wrote all about it in his blog, and i was enjoying that good read, when i noticed the he referred to me as a person of  "MIDDLE AGE".

He may have not known it (and i normally wouldn't admit this "mid life crisis" embarrassment,) but those two words fucked with me. I still thought of myself as a youngin'. Hell, it wasn't long ago that i was fighting in the ring (im a retired Golden Gloves boxer / Muay Thai kickboxer.) I still skateboard. Damn it. Middle Aged?..... Fuck that, my glass isn't half empty!

Then this week the brief  mid life crisis ended and my viewpoint on life has changed completely....

On Cinco De Mayo i was noticing that my crap was looking funny-- black and tar like. From my past as a fighter (when i was knocked senseless and consumed so much blood into my stomach,) i knew it was old blood. I was also getting bad stomach pains by that night. Concerned, i reached out to my doctor-- and she told me to immediately get to the emergency room...

Yeah..... i'll admint it-- the doctor stuck his finger up my ass for a fecal sample. But that really isn't shit compared to what's to come....

After testing the sample and confirming blood, i learned i needed to get a tube down the nose and into my stomach so that they could pump my stomach & check for blood. Getting that tube sucked, and as it went down it triggered my gag reflex and i puked...... what seemed like a gallon of blood all over myself and others. I looked down at the blood, and the portrait of my daughter on my forearm-- and that was it..... i thought i was going to die. While i made my best effort of a brave face, inside at that moment i was thinking the worse-- and i was scared.

That night the bleeding stopped, my stomach was pumped and i was put to bed in ICU so that i could await the joy of the next days "camera down the throat" test to determine my destiny towards life or death (my fear was cancer.) I didn't sleep a wink, and i prepared myself for tomorrows judgment-- all the while listening to my roommate barely hang onto life.

My neighbor in intensive care was Don, a gentlemen who was about 80 years old. Cancer was deep into it's evil deed and he was here preparing for his last trip home to die. The next morning he was chipper and told me stories about his service in World War II. Later that day hospital staff closed the curtain between us so that they could talk to him about his "do not resessitate" paperwork before he went home. I cried as i heard him bravely say he was ready to go when god comes calling for him, and told his wife that she was beautiful and that he loved her.

The end was near for Don, and at the same time he prepared to die, i learned i would live-- i just had esophagus ulcers, and they can heal easily w/ medication and diligence.

Somewhere along in my world travels over the past year i caught the h.pylori bacteria and it's been secretly helping eat away at my lower esophagus. I had no idea of what was happening until this week, when it finally hit a large blood vessel and i started bleeding from both ends.

The next day i left ICU to stay in the "regular" part of the hospital. As i left, Don tried his best to smile and told me how great it was that i was leaving, because i sounded in bad shape the night before. God bless you Don. I don't even know your last name, but i will never forget you.

My next room mate was Eduardo, a 72 year old man with late state Alzheimer's. He took this trip to the hospital because his son and family can no longer care for him. He's now completely delusional and doesn't know who he is, where he is or who his family is. He's trapped in a dark world, afraid and the life he once knew was over.

Whenever someone tried to touch Eduardo, he'd panic and attack. I smiled for him as i watched him punch one lame hospital orderly in the face. He fought his restraints through much of the night. For 72 yrs old, his body looked healthy, but his mind was gone. We didnt bond like i did with Don (because i think he thought i was there to kill him,) but I'll always remember Eduardo too.

I'm glad to be home. I'm on medication that will help heal my esophagus-- the doctor said in about 3 months it'll be completely healed if i follow directions. In 5-6 weeks my red blood cell count will be back to normal (it's very low for a while, since i lost so much blood and refused transfusion.) I'm not going to die, like i thought i was 2 nights before-- and im on the mend to being back to my former, healthy self.

Sitting here thinking about my experience and Iowahawk's comment, i now have to say that I'M STOKED if i'm really middle aged and i'd love nothing more to be. Hell, i don't even remember 1971 when i was born-- and my glass of life could still be half full? Fuck yeah!

When you look at things via the right perspective, how could you not LOVE being called the "M" word ?

-scott noteboom

BTW: Disclaimer-- According to my Mamma, we've got color in the family tree. Thus, in this case i believe i gotta pass to use the 'M' word as necessary in appropriate places. Besides i just almost died and am still half way delirious. So, no need to beat ME like Reginald Denny....

Comments

[iowahawk]

Oh man, that's some scary shit (no pun intended) and glad to hear you're alright. I'm just hoping it slowed you down enough that I can escape your planned curb stomp.

Being several years younger than me, you'll eventually heal and track me down, but I've got a plan B: play the Noteboom-has-pity-for-Alzheimer-victims strategem.

I'm losing my mind too, you know.

[COOP]

I'm hitting 40 this year, and I'm a little bit freaked out, but only because I don't properly feel forty. I still feel like the same dumbass I was 20 years ago. Shouldn't I be a little smarter at this point?

[iowahawk]

Buy a pair of pleated Dockers! Feel that stay-pressed maturity.

[jkundra]

Hey, you've survived the worst of it.

As for Iowahawk, what do you expect from a guy who seems to do little more than travel around around the world guzzling tequila and pretending that his Sears Visa card "doesn't work"?

When you finally get angry enough to let him have it with one of the Cuervo Gold bottles he's emptied, he'll pull the pathetic Alzheimer-victim routine he's alluded to above: "Hey, where am I? Oh, hi Mom!" Etc., etc., until he tries to disappear, pretexting that it's time to get on his Schwinn and do his paper-route.

It's either that or, if he figures that you're even drunker than he is, he'll try to pull the "My good friends in Juarez have empowered me with the ability to declare you an Honorary Mexican" gambit - imagining that you'll feel so awed as to pay for the bottle of Cuervo Reserva de la Familia he's just ordered as part of the "ceremony."

And the terrible thing about all of this is that it somehow works: I'm really looking forward for him to come back for the pleasure of spending another long evening of increasingly disjointed but always-fascinating conversation with this genial and erudite hombre...

Prof. Jonathan
Paris, Texas

[COOP]

Iowahawk is the "Grampa" Al Lewis of the internets.

[Prof. Jonathan]

There are so many different opinions and sightings that I'm beginning to think that the person we call 'Iowahawk' is actually a clever franchise operation consisting of a kit containing a pipe, a geeky pair of glasses, a maxed-out Sears Visa card and an immoderate taste for Tequila (as long as someone else is paying).

The perp and mastermind of this operation - "Rev." Burge himself - is the living illustration of what can happen when good Mid-western stock goes wrong.