I asked Mom what she thought my problem was. She said she thought I must be diabetic. That did not sit particularly well with me. I remembered Aunt Verda and did not have any desire to live like that. She had to have multiple insulin shots every day. She was housebound and out of her mind half the time. That is what my image of Diabetes was. I was too scared to ask Mom if that's what Diabetes did to a person so I was petrified for the next ten days.

I've never had ten days fly by like that. "The day" was there in the blink of an eye it seems. I really didn't want to be diabetic. I didn't think I could handle getting shots all the effing time and being stuck in the house.

"The day" blurred by. My only coherent memory was that of Bobby McAdams, a member of the drum section who sat by me in sixth period English. I told him I didn't think I could handle giving myself shots and being unable to leave the house for the rest of my life. He said maybe it wasn't Diabetes after all, maybe it was because of the flu. He also said he didn't think Diabetes was that bad. Yeah, I had to take shots but I wasn't stuck in the house forever unless something else happened.

[You have to remember, there was no Internet back then and encyclopedias were not that helpful.]

I still appreciate his trying to make me feel better. He was always one of the precious few people who didn't go out of his way to make me feel like crap 99% of the time. My mood lifted and I took out my lighter (yes, I smoked in high school and for many years after) and started flicking it while we all waited for class to start. I started stupidly lighting the lighter behind the head of Mark Woods, another band member who sat in front of me.

As friends, Mark and I were on again, off again. He played baritone and when it was just the two of us, he was pretty decent to me and we could talk about pretty much anything. But let him get around a few others and he gladly helped to make it rain crap on me all day long. Why I continued to have anything to do with him is simply a mystery now. I guess for me, any friendship, even part-time, was better than none. Man, does that sound pathetic?

At any rate, this was 1977. Guys used hairspray almost as much as girls. When I flicked my lighter close behind his perfectly coiffed hair, there was a small, audible whumpf! and a layer of blue flame covered the back of Mark's head. Panicked, I started slapping his head with both hands to try to put out the fire. The smell of burnt hair hung in the air. Mark turned around and said "What the fuck are you doing!?!" I told him I'd set his hair ablaze and was trying to put it out.

I was still swatting at his smoldering hair and he was about to punch me deservedly in the face. Unbeknownst to us, the teacher had entered the room and was sitting behind her desk where she must have witnessed most of the whole sorry event. Needless to say, we were sent to the principal's office where I received "three licks" with a massive hickory paddle with Mr. Porter's name burned into it in two inch letters. I also had my lighter confiscated.

Mark was not punished. Wisely, threatening to punch the person who set you on fire was not a punishable offense. Sure the paddling hurt but at least Mark's hair was only scorched and he only had to get a haircut to hide my pyromaniac handiwork. It could have been a lot worse. He punched the living crap out of my arm on the way back to class. That hurt for a couple of days and it left a nice bruise but really, it was a small price to pay. Moral to the story: Don't use AquaNet on your hair around some yahoo with a lighter and nothing else to do.

Another thing about the 70s for you "young'uns" out there. There was real, tangible punishment in school. It was not a threat. It was a guarantee. Plus, if the offense was severe enough, the school called your parents. So you got it twice. It's a shame how school has evolved into students punishing teachers.

Guess it's just as well that I don't have any kids. In my humble opinion, a spanking has never permanently hurt any child. By the way, I define "spanking" as three or four solid swats on the butt by hand or even with a belt. How many of my generation have had to get their own switch?

Anyway, I have four surviving brothers who can attest to the fact that spankings or paddlings made you think twice before you did something stupid, except in my case, obviously. And God help you if Dad was in charge of the punishment. Just suffice it to say, I'm glad I went to school when I did. We learned discipline along with everything else.

We didn't get bruises or welts or beaten, we just got spanked. Why does any parent feel the need to go any farther?

I'm a little out of control on the whole spanking thing, aren't I? OK, on with the show.

After my sixth period arsonist/firefighting episode, I went out to the school parking lot, walking as slowly as I could. Eventually, I came to my blue 1974 Ford Pinto Runabout that I had bought from my brother Jeff. "Runabout" meant it was a hatchback. Only a marketing genius could explain the logic. I got in, throwing my books into the back seat and just sat there for a couple of minutes. I finally convinced myself to put the key in the ignition switch.

"God, please let my battery be dead!"

Mom was pulling a cashier's shift for short-handed Dad and couldn't leave until 5 pm. Dad couldn't leave until his assistant came in at 6 pm. There's hope! The engine started immediately. Damn it all, anyway!

I took the long way to the doctor's office. I stopped to get a Coke. I considered a Tab or a Fresca but said, "WTF" and got a Coke. It's probably going to be my last one, I said to myself. I was becoming resigned to the fact of life with Diabetes. Those of you interested in String Theory might tell me I created my own reality but regardless, whoever the reality belonged to, it was beginning to settle in as mine.

I circled the block several times, killing time till four o'clock. Finally, at three fifty-five, I parked and went into the reception area, signed in and sat down.

I was called back fairly quickly and led to a room. The nurse took my blood pressure and asked why I was there, what were my symptoms, etc.. When I told her what we thought, she agreed that it did sound like Diabetes. Fucking great. Hallelujah and a-men! There went my hopes for a last minute reprieve.

She left me to my own squirming mental picture of my fate. After time had flown like a bat out of hell for the last ten days, NOW it decided to ddrraaaaggggg along. Just come on and get it the hell over with! Please!

Finally, Dr. Gilliland came in and shook my hand. He asked me about my symptoms and what I'd been going through. He was very thorough. He asked if I thought I could give them a urine specimen. I told him "definitely not a problem" and followed him out into the hall. He called the nurse and she gave me the dreaded cup and aimed me toward the restroom.

After filling the cup, I went back to my little 6-sided cubicle to await my fate. A few minutes later, he came back into the room and asked if either of my parents could take me to the hospital. Nothing in my life up to that point sounded worse than that question.

I asked him what was wrong and he told me my urine was extremely high in sugar. Of course that meant nothing to me but I figured it was bad if my parents and the hospital were involved. I asked him what it meant and he told me there should be zero sugar or, at worst, a trace. Great. Lucky me.

He went on to explain that when the sugar levels in the blood gets too high, the body starts trying to flush it out of the system by sending it to the kidneys to be filtered out. This was, along with the excessive thirst and urination, a classic sign of Diabetes. There! It was almost unanimous! Mom, the nurse, now the doctor. Three strikes and you're out! I wanted to die.

He had me follow him down to a room they used as a lab. He pulled a little gray box out of his coat pocket and from the box pulled about two inches of yellow tape about a quarter-inch wide. My cup of urine was on the counter. He told me urine should be yellow. Mine was totally clear which meant it was almost all water except for the sugar. He explained that the tape, when dipped in the urine specimen, should stay yellow in color. He dipped the strip into my urine and it instantly turned black.

Dr. Gilliland told me he'd never seen it turn that black that fast in his career. He commented that it was like dipping the tape in black ink. Great, at least I'm good at amazing my doctor. His guess was that my blood sugar was over 500 mg/dl. Again, that was lost on me and my head was starting to hurt, I guess from the adrenalin. He explained that normal glucose levels are between 80 and 120. Surprised I wasn't comatose, he explained I needed insulin very quickly to bring my sugar down to normal and the best place to do that was the hospital. He also needed to run a series of tests to be absolutely sure what was wrong.

I used the office phone to call Mom and Dad. Dad turned into a one-man show taking orders and packing so Mom could meet me at the doctor's office. Against all my protests, Dr. Gilliland said it wasn't safe for me to drive. He said I could black out at any time. I rode with Mom to be admitted to the hospital.

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 4

Chapter 5