Written in First or Second Person Tense?

You are someone who has come a long way. You were born with cysts in your head which required multiple surgeries, many exploratory in nature since there weren’t MRI’s or CT’s in the day. All but two were removed. Those which remain are positioned between the two hemispheres of your brain, a touchy place to experiment in the 1960’s.At age 5, you experienced a grand mal seizure. Doctors attributed the seizure to the scar tissue left from the surgeries you underwent at birth. As a precaution, you were put on medications until you weaned yourself off of them by 6th grade. As a result of those cysts, you were born with a head that was quite large. This left you subject to much ridicule and challenges when you were growing up, whether you were called “Big Head” or “Egg Head.” You could never find a batting helmet or marching band uniform hat large enough and you had to make do. Baseball caps were created by fusing two baseball caps together. Sometimes they weren’t exactly non-descript.

The ridicule lasted through fifth grade and by that time you were the outcast. The ridicule resumed when you entered high school. What you thought was behind you only resurfaced to slap you in your face all over again. Only the words and ridicule were worse. You so wanted to fight back with words. Words that for the most part shut them up when you would say, “God had to give someone a brain.”

College seemed to be the turn around when you could be yourself. Yet you never took advantage of expressing yourself as a gay man by joining GLBT organizations. Your excuse was the large marching band that you were a part of and that you would see fellow members all over campus. However, there was that one guy you met freshman year who was also in the band. You went to his dorm room to spend the night after a long night of rehearsals. And you positioned yourselves at opposite ends of the bed so that no one may get any “ideas.” The following morning, you see that one of his roommates was someone you knew from high school.

Then in October of 1986, the unthinkable happened. It was a Thursday night when everyone on the dorm floor had their doors open and were watching The Cosby Show. You told your roommate that you didn’t feel good, so you sat down on your bed. Soon you were in and out of consciousness, starting to experience a grand mal seizure. The last you recall was that you were on the cold floor at the foot of your roommate’s bed looking under at the bedsprings. And then your roommate threw a pillow on top of your face. It was to protect you from the piping under the sink nearby. When you awoke, you were quite groggy and lying on a gurney in the ER of Mercy Hospital. You slowly lifted your head and noted a clock between your feet. It read “8:34 PM.” You then looked at all the people who were standing around the gurney. It was all the guys from the third floor dorm hall that you were with earlier. I recall you then laying you head as you began to cry at the sight of everyone there. But it wasn’t out of embarrassment or shame, but that the guys cared.

Doctors at the hospital began taking tests and x-rays to figure out what was wrong. In the meantime, you asked to be discharged because you were concerned about missing your Architecture studio classes and marching band practice. Two days later you were performing at Memorial Stadium. Then Tuesday afternoon arrived when you received a call from the neurologist. He announced to you the worst news that any person could ever hear. He stated that you had only weeks to live and that you were going to die from a cerebral hemorrhage. You couldn’t believe the news that you received over the telephone. You went into a state of panic and terror, running to the other end of the third floor dorm hall to tell your friends what you had been told. You were trying to get the news out between the sobbing and holding back of tears. You called your mother and father to tell them what you had been told and the first thing they asked you was, “Did you tell them about your pre-existing condition?” You then asked, “My what?” You mother and father then got in direct contact with the neurologist to inform them that the cysts that exist have been there since your birth and that you have been closely monitored. Your mother and father were down the following day with x-rays in tow to show the neurologist. By that weekend, your diagnosis was rescinded.

Since that time you have become an emotional person. You have taken that experience as one where you “tear up”, and sometimes even cry, at the least touching stories or events. Or even a sentimental movie. It definitely has shaped you.

Because of these events that have shaped your life, you have become someone who truly cares for others. You are one to always show good deeds toward others as a way of showing you have interest in them, rather than though communication. And because you were admittedly shy. Many times that has burned you in the end when you have gotten yourself too emotionally involved with someone, only to discover the same feelings were not being reciprocated; which then really hurt you.

Because you have inherited many of your mother’s genes, you began to discover after college how your hair was disappearing. This disappearance of hair only led to the revelation of all the scars left by the surgeries you endured as an infant. Now it was another facet of confrontation you had to deal with. Every person you met, whether platonic, romantic, or from a stranger had to ask what the scarring was from. It got to be a burden and your self-confidence began to plummet. You decided to invest in “units” as they were called, to cover up those scars. These units were no where near the humiliation of toupees would be, and it gave you a new life and self-confidence.

However, you began to think how shallow people must be that all of a sudden took interest in you after being what you considered an “ogre” for so long. The difference was seen almost immediately when you joined another GLBT organization in the western suburbs. The one you belonged to in the northern suburbs seemed to not find you worthy before when you had a pronounced receding hairline. How would the members of the western suburbs accept you if one day you decided to shave your head and reveal the true you, scars and all?

But the members took you in immediately as one of their own. I could see how you had grown and become accepting of yourself. You have made some very great friends. Unfortunately, a decision to get romantically involved with someone you have considered to be your confidant has backfired on you. The two of you would be in communiqués almost daily and now the silence between you two has to be deafening. It’s must hurt you terribly. All this in your quest to simply be loved.

Love Me