X-Box, movies, cartoons, Gameboy, coloring books, ceramics, Webkinz on mom’s laptop, many stuffed animals, and root beer floats for lunch while hanging out in an adjustable bed. The scene looks like something out of Home Alone 2. The starring role belongs to a handsome five-year-old brunette who rivals, if not surpasses, Macaulay Culkin in both cuteness and charm.
But, he is not in a hotel gorging on candy. He isn’t on vacation although he does enjoy all the gifts and junk food that must not be shared with his two brothers and sister. His holiday fails to be restful and pleasurable as poking and prodding continually interrupts his Phineas and Ferb marathon. Electrical wires on his head to monitor the activity of his brain are only a minor nuisance for a Super Mario Brothers champion.
No amount of needles and medical devices can slow down a practical joker. Physical limitations only make the mind sharper, meaner and more imaginative. He soon discovers there are no shortage of ways to mess with nurses and doctors like moving the bed up and down during examinations, sticking out his tongue, or doing the standard same answer to everything trick. “Does it hurt?” Yes. “Does it not hurt?” Yes.
His standard answer is easily dismissed as him not understanding the questions and prompts little response from his caregivers. So, he tweaks his answers. “How are you feeling?” Poo-poo. “Can I examine you?” Poo-poo. “Where did you get those dimples?” In your butt.
One could call him a hostile patient or just an inconvenienced five-year-old who really doesn’t have time in his busy schedule of coloring, Gameboy playing and mischief making to be interrupted. Other than the annoyance of a weak left hand and a partial seizure here and there that sometimes makes him fall or causes his leg or arm to shake for a few seconds, he goes about his life and resumes his activities whether he is playing Wii or Kung-Fu fighting with his younger brother. He fails to know that his trip to the hospital has forever changed his paradigm of normal. X-Box, movies, cartoons, Gameboy, coloring books, ceramics, Webkinz on mom’s laptop will never be quite the same.
