A little bump in the road

Two weeks ago was FCNL's Annual Meeting, Thursday afternoon to Sunday. I took Raleigh to Colin's to stay there for the weekend so we could share dog duties. On Saturday morning we were biking up Pennsylvania Ave's bike lane to get to the Annual Meeting hotel when I crashed my bike.

Actually, my memory of the morning goes like this:
I'm leading, and I'm feeling good. The air is cool but not cold, the bike wants to go. I'm cruising -- not too fast, but not dawdling, either. We're getting close to the White House, where the lane ends. We're at maybe 11th or 12th.

Then I'm being loaded into an ambulance, strapped to the stretcher. Colin climbs in the front. I fade out.

I'm on the stretcher in the ambulance. There's a guy near my head and he's talking to me. He's asking me something. He's asking me if I know where I am, what day it is. I think about it. I have to think about thinking in order to think. Thinking is slow. I have no idea what month it is, what time of day, why I am in an ambulance. Thinking is like wading through a thick sludge. Slowly it comes to me that maybe, possibly, it is the weekend. I think I was going somewhere. Is it the weekend? More wading. Is it November? Maybe? The guy, my ambulance buddy, asks me if I know how old I am. Or maybe question was first, before November? I slowly process the words, individually, then as a unit. I think about it. I think slowly about it. I can't remember if I'm 22 or 23. I start to get upset. How can I not remember how old I am? I think that maybe I just had a birthday. I am pretty sure I'm 22 or 23.

Then we are at the hospital. My ambulance guy asks me if I use instructables.com. "Instructables?" I say. "No," somewhat authoritatively, although 10 minutes ago (20? more?) I couldn't have told you what month it was. "I guess I lost that bet," he says, laughing.

They wheel me in, I guess, but I'm in and out. Colin is there, answering questions before I've waded through what it was that was just asked. Good. I probably couldn't answer, anyway.

I ask Colin what happened. "You crashed your bike," he tells me. "I crashed my bike?" I can't remember crashing my bike. I start to get upset again. I crashed my bike. I can't remember crashing my bike. I can't remember.

Doctors come in and out. They slowly turn my head, check my spine, unstrap me. My spine is not broken. They give me a tetanus shot, which hurts more than my head. I follow fingers left and right without moving my head, up and down. Lights in my eyes. More fingers. A woman takes me to get a CT scan. Colin has to wait. The woman, a different woman, tells me to close my eyes and be still. I tell her that won't be a problem. All I want to do is close my eyes and be still.

They scan my head. Slowly up and down, pausing here and there. Whirring. It's like being a sheet of paper in a machine, with the line of light that I can see, moving, through my closed eyelids.

Just out of the hospital, going to CVS

We go back to the room with the curtain and the machines and a view of the nurses' station. More time passes. They tell me my CT scan is negative -- that's a good thing. It means I just have a concussion. I am to take it easy and take pain pills. I might have headaches for a while, or I might not. I am free to go.

Colin and I get directions to a CVS to get me ibuprofen, Tylenol with codeine, and sunglasses. I guess I was wearing mine when I crashed. They're bent. The CVS pharmacy is closed, so I get sunglasses and we take a cab to Annual Meeting. Colin gives directions. Colin gets the key to Tommy's room, where I gratefully lay down.

Colin wakes me up for business meeting, like I asked. This is why I'm at Annual Meeting -- for the business meetings. I am not going to miss business meeting. I think Colin got pills while I slept, though now, two weeks later, I can't remember. I sit behind the sound equipment with Colin, who, after seeing me motionless on the pavement, does not want me to go too far away. He saved me a veggie wrap from lunch, he brings me juice and water. I'm very hungry, but I realize I must have jammed my jaw because it hurts terribly to chew. My head hurts. Everything is slow. I take more codeine and ibuprofen.

I feel like I might puke -- probably the ibuprofen on a nearly empty stomach, my jaw too sore to chew. It's almost the end of business meeting but I stand up, go slowly to the bathroom. I sit on the toilet, put my head in my hands. I am not going to throw up, so I get up and go to the lobby.

Standing there, telling some FCNL people what happened, why I am now fine and able to go to business meeting, everything starts rushing. The sides, my peripheral, starts to go fuzzy and drop away. I know this. This happened to me once before. "A chair, get me a chair," I say. Stephen's face is worried, he gets me a chair. The rushing is so loud I can't hear them, can hardly hear myself. They want to lay me on the floor, but people are coming out of business meeting. "Not here," I say. I hear, "A wheelchair. Yes, now!" I fade out.

We're at the elevator. It's very important that I be backed into the elevator. I have a group of waists around me. I fade out again.

They're trying to get me through the door to Tommy's room, but the wheelchair is too wide. They have the wheelchair tipped and my head is falling back. There is a belly behind me but too far to lean my head on. It hurts. The wheelchair is too wide, so they carry me, although I am in and out. I'm on the bed. The rushing is quieting. My peripheral is coming back. "I feel better," I say. "I'm feeling better." Two members of the General Committee who are physicians are there, and they are worried about my blood getting to my brain, worried that I passed out (sort of, nearly), worried about leaving me without a promise of monitoring. I am put back in the wheelchair. We go back to the hospital.