When I awoke the next morning, the reality of where I was and how I got there became clear to me. A medical staff monitored my condition and administered medication three times a day. Prior to this, the only pills I'd ever taken before were children's aspirin and Flintstone vitamins. It became a question to the medical staff what caused the granwal seizure, but with my medical history showing previous epileptic seizures, they suspected an electrical imbalance with my brain function. Many electroencephalogram (EEG) tests followed for the next two years. My stay in the hospital left me feeling restless and bored. I received a get well card from my classmates and my grandmother brought me some coloring books and crayons to help occupy the time. Of all the visitors who came to see me, my mother spent the most time with me. When my father came to see me, I felt reassured that his presence never drifted too far from reach. His appearance gave a few affirmations to a few uncertainties.
My stay in the hospital lasted a week. I spent the days getting into mischief with the nurses at the front desk by turning on my "emergency" light and asking for help with crossword puzzles. The staff admitted a Japanese boy to my room my last day there. We played together endlessly, having no skills with each others language. We seemed to have enough innocence to take away the barrier of audible communication and built an understanding through our actions. My discharge from the hospital came a few hours later. A nurse entered the room with a wheelchair and asked me if I was ready to go home. No doubt I was ready, but didn't really feel the necessity of the wheelchair to make a departure.
Returning home to the comforts I missed became an appreciation I greeted with open arms. We only lived in the apartment for a few months before my incident put me in the hospital. I never fully explored the amenities this dutch colonial home offered, and now the opportunities presented themselves again. When I entered the front door, my mom introduced me to the new tenant who recently moved in on the main floor. He was a Northwood student who came from India. He took an instant liking to me and my brother and asked for our assistance to watch his apartment for him on the days he traveled. No big deal to most, but he was the only person in the neighborhood with cable and a color tv. He became a joy to be around as our downstairs neighbor. Though he never really doted on my brother or me, he always remained very courteous and inviting to us.
Winter came before we knew it and brought a few discoveries to light regarding the home. Each unit came equipped with their own hot water tank in the basement, so any chance of running out of hot water seemed impossible. The furnace heated the entire house. The center of the basement held a huge antique wood burning stove that was big enough to put a person in it, later converted and modified to accommodate natural gas for a fuel source. Wall ducts supplied heat from the basement to the main and upper floors. The only disadvantage with the wall ducts on the upper floor became the smells created on the main floor, as they permeated every room upstairs through them. We suspected our neighbor attempted to create ethnic cuisine for himself on one occasion and burned it, leaving us to deal with the awful stench for weeks. When my mom questioned him about the smell, he claimed that he never cooked for himself and lived on fast food. The intensity increased when the furnace kicked on, but ultimately it subsided. We had the pleasure of sharing the house with our downstairs neighbor for only a few months, then one day he left without saying a word.
We became the sole occupants of the house during the middle of winter. The unit on the main floor remained locked from every entrance and no longer inhabited. Strange things started occurring soon after we became the only tenants in the house. A week after our neighbor left, the smell came back in full force. Oddly though, it only became noticeable at night. My brother and I shared a room together that had a wall vent. We started paying less attention to the smell as it became annoyingly familiar. Within days, I started hearing the sound of sizzling meat echoing from the vents at night coupled with the smell. As the nights passed, the smell grew worse and the sound changed to a hiss. I asked my mom and brother their opinions about the sounds and smells and to my surprise, they didn't know what I was talking about.
My stay in the hospital lasted a week. I spent the days getting into mischief with the nurses at the front desk by turning on my "emergency" light and asking for help with crossword puzzles. The staff admitted a Japanese boy to my room my last day there. We played together endlessly, having no skills with each others language. We seemed to have enough innocence to take away the barrier of audible communication and built an understanding through our actions. My discharge from the hospital came a few hours later. A nurse entered the room with a wheelchair and asked me if I was ready to go home. No doubt I was ready, but didn't really feel the necessity of the wheelchair to make a departure.
Returning home to the comforts I missed became an appreciation I greeted with open arms. We only lived in the apartment for a few months before my incident put me in the hospital. I never fully explored the amenities this dutch colonial home offered, and now the opportunities presented themselves again. When I entered the front door, my mom introduced me to the new tenant who recently moved in on the main floor. He was a Northwood student who came from India. He took an instant liking to me and my brother and asked for our assistance to watch his apartment for him on the days he traveled. No big deal to most, but he was the only person in the neighborhood with cable and a color tv. He became a joy to be around as our downstairs neighbor. Though he never really doted on my brother or me, he always remained very courteous and inviting to us.
Winter came before we knew it and brought a few discoveries to light regarding the home. Each unit came equipped with their own hot water tank in the basement, so any chance of running out of hot water seemed impossible. The furnace heated the entire house. The center of the basement held a huge antique wood burning stove that was big enough to put a person in it, later converted and modified to accommodate natural gas for a fuel source. Wall ducts supplied heat from the basement to the main and upper floors. The only disadvantage with the wall ducts on the upper floor became the smells created on the main floor, as they permeated every room upstairs through them. We suspected our neighbor attempted to create ethnic cuisine for himself on one occasion and burned it, leaving us to deal with the awful stench for weeks. When my mom questioned him about the smell, he claimed that he never cooked for himself and lived on fast food. The intensity increased when the furnace kicked on, but ultimately it subsided. We had the pleasure of sharing the house with our downstairs neighbor for only a few months, then one day he left without saying a word.
We became the sole occupants of the house during the middle of winter. The unit on the main floor remained locked from every entrance and no longer inhabited. Strange things started occurring soon after we became the only tenants in the house. A week after our neighbor left, the smell came back in full force. Oddly though, it only became noticeable at night. My brother and I shared a room together that had a wall vent. We started paying less attention to the smell as it became annoyingly familiar. Within days, I started hearing the sound of sizzling meat echoing from the vents at night coupled with the smell. As the nights passed, the smell grew worse and the sound changed to a hiss. I asked my mom and brother their opinions about the sounds and smells and to my surprise, they didn't know what I was talking about.
