Popeye and the Seizurous Kid
Ma says I was a sick little kid. Seizures caused my body to go limp. If you didn’t know any better, I looked as if I’d fallen asleep. “Oh, how cute,” some shopper once observed, as I suddenly flopped over the child seat of a grocery cart. Less cute were the times I’d start puking without warning. Along with that, my eyes would roll up and disappear into my head. While staring upside down at my brain, perhaps I tried expressing to it some variation of, “WTF?” Doctors were at a loss. I’d only say that my head hurt. “Migraines,” the doctors speculated. “When your boy grows up,” said one doctor, “ask him what was going on.” Forty-odd years later, Ma asked. I replied, “Do you remember when you were three years old?” She didn’t. But did I remembered the Popeye doll? I did. Ma bought the doll for me when I was in the hospital. I don’t remember being there. When you pulled the strin...