The Saga of a Broken Head

1

It was October '06 (I believe), and my church youth group was on a fall retreat north of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. On Saturday night we played the traditional 1 o'clock in the morning game of capture the flashlight-in-a-bucket. The location and conditions were optimal that night—we played in the woods and the sky was overcast, making the visibility low. As usual, there were two teams—the members of one wearing pink glow-bracelets and those of the other wearing green ones—whose primary goal was to find their flashlight in a bucket and return to the clearing that served as base/jail. The team members were told that they must never ever, under any circumstances, hide their glow-in-the-dark bracelets. They also had to avoid falling victim to the stealth shadow cunning and sneaky terror agents of darkness and possessors of unnatural speed (or, simply, the secret agents), whose sole point of existence was to prevent either of the teams from winning. Anyone tagged by a secret agent would usually scream or shout in terror, and was then obliged to proceed directly to jail. In accordance to the tradition of the game, there were only two secret agents, and they did not wear glowing accessories—they dressed in black.

After the previous fall retreat of 2005, in which a team member fell headlong into a wooden bench and bit through his lip while fleeing desperately from a secret agent, the youth were encouraged to use caution and restraint while playing.

After the fall retreat of 2006, the game was never played again.

2

I always loved playing as a secret agent. By fall 2006 I was notorious for my ability to sneak up on or run down anyone wearing a glow bracelet. I was very chivalrous, never intentionally frightening ladies. I would generally just jog silently up and tap them on the shoulder, at which point they would scream in surprise nonetheless. Should my prey notice me and run, I would give chase and mercilessly chase them down. However, with the memory of the guy I chased into a bench still fresh in my mind from the year before, I was very careful. After a while, people started to surrender rather than be put to the chase.

On that fateful Saturday night (well, technically it was Sunday morning) in October, I was a secret agent and my brother, who was finally old enough to be at the retreat with me, was a member of the green team. As the night progressed I tagged many people and established myself once again as the terror of the night, but, as is always the case, the teams drew closer and closer to their inevitable victory. Finally, at about 1:30 am, the green team managed to get their bucket and flashlight onto a main path through the woods—the path that led to the base. With the base clearing in site, the only obstacle for them to surmount was me, the lone secret agent that stood on the path. When I saw a horde of seven or eight green bracelets and a flash-lit bucket jogging my way, I broke into a sprint, desperate to stop them. I was running at about fifteen miles per hour, closing in rapidly until the leading bracelet was only forty feet away. Thirty. Twenty… At about fifteen feet I was about to hit the brakes when I suddenly received such a massive blow to my forehead that my head was stopped cold while my feet flew out in front of me. Still under the effect of some serious momentum, my body sailed parallel to the ground for about six feet before my back finally hit the dirt. They say the collision sounded like two large rocks hitting each other with a hint of watermelon hitting asphalt. I didn’t hear it.

3

In fact, not only did I not hear it, but other than a dull feeling of shock, I felt little pain. I did not lose consciousness. When I hit the ground everything was sort of hazy and I was seeing stars, but I stayed aware. Then I started to hear someone wailing in pain. I realized in quick succession that, 1: that thing my head had smashed into was a person, 2: that person sounded seriously injured, and 3: that person sounded a lot like my little brother. I rose up from the ground and staggered over to the figure lying on the ground, joining the growing crowd gathered in concern. It was Daniel. My brother was on his back moaning and wailing with pain, his hands on his forehead. I was terrified. My voice joined the chorus of concern, asking him if he was all right, calling his name, asking him to let us see, holding up fingers, asking him if he could sit up, asking him if he could move anything. I noticed that my nose was bleeding. Great ... just great.

After a few minutes, Daniel was able to catch his breath and overcome the shock and pain. Everyone was much relieved—it seemed that no one was seriously injured. By this time, everyone knew the game was over and we started to pack up. Although I was rather miffed at my brother for stowing his glow bracelet in his pocket, I was happy that he had not been hurt badly. Like my usual self, I was determined to let everyone know I was all right. It was just a bloody nose—I felt my face—and a black eye. Ugh. To prove my state of being all right, I insisted on carrying the hot dog/bun/marshmallow container back. Someone else insisted otherwise. I wound up giving in. It was about a quarter mile back to the recreational/dining building that was the center of our activities. By the time we arrived I was getting rather irritated at my bloody nose and was starting to feel a little tired. My brother didn’t feel too hot either, so we went into the dining room to lie down for a while. Our youth pastor, Chris, and my father, who was also at the retreat as a cabin leader, came in with us and encouraged everyone else to give us space. The rest of the youth, assured that we were fine and just needed some recovery time, went downstairs and watched a movie.

Armed with a thick accordion of paper towels, I laid down determined to conquer this bloody nose. Usually this tactic works. However, this time the blood was thinner than I remember it ever being, and instead of coagulating, it just kept flowing back into my throat. I did the only thing I could think of doing—I waited for it to stop. Meanwhile, I was starting to get cold. My dad had some emergency response training and told me that I was going into shock. It didn’t surprise me much, considering the impact my head had experienced. I probably had a concussion, but that was nothing new. I hadn’t even lost consciousness, so it couldn’t be that bad … But the black eye … I was rather irritated about that. It takes so long for those stupid things to go away. So I wrapped myself in my jacket and shivered away, irked at the disfigurement of my face and impatiently awaiting the moment when the flow of blood from my nose would stop. I waited, and waited, and waited, but it would not stop. Chris was long gone, having the responsibility to get all the other youth to sleep. My brother eventually got up and went to his cabin to go to bed. By two thirty in the morning it was just me, my dad, and my persistent nosebleed.

4

I began to lose track of time. At some point I began to feel very nauseous, and because everyone had gone off to their cabins to sleep, my dad and I went downstairs where it was warmer. The movement pushed me past the verge of nausea and I staggered to the nearest trashcan. Bent double over the can, I began spewing dark pink vomit. The taste and smell of blood was overwhelming. My nose had been bleeding steadily into my stomach for hours, and for ten or fifteen minutes I did nothing but vomit it back out. My nose, in the meantime, did not stop bleeding.

At this point, both my dad and I decided that this might be more serious than a simple nosebleed. A couple who had driven up to the retreat separately drowsily offered their car, and my father and I began the drive to the Harrisburg hospital. That drive was miserable. I had a small trashcan between my legs, and though there was really not that much left in my stomach to throw up, I did manage to empty it further. Every time we hit a bump I felt my stomach turn. I had never felt this nauseous before. I have always had a rather strong stomach, but ever since that day I feel slightly nauseous at the smell or taste of blood.

By the time we got to the hospital it was light out. As we walked through the front door I noticed with relief that my nose, after probably four or five hours, had finally stopped bleeding. I was ecstatic. We were escorted to the emergency care unit at the hospital and I was put in a bed and hooked to an IV to replace all the vital nutrition and fluids I had lost. Eventually, they unhooked me, led me to a CAT scanner, performed a scan, and led me back. As I lay there staring at the ceiling, wondering what had actually happened to my head, I felt surprisingly at peace. I was prepared to hear the worst, prepared even to let go of life if necessary.

When I heard a nurse whispering to my father in a very subdued manner, I knew the diagnosis was not good. After a few minutes, they came into my room. I made eye contact and assured the nurse that I was ready to hear whatever news she had. She looked down at her clipboard for a bit, and after warning me that the news was not good at all, began explaining. My skull had been fractured in four places around the left eye, including both the front and back walls of my left sinus, which had allowed air to get into my brain. Having air in the brain is apparently a very bad thing, as it can and often does lead to infection, meningitis, and death. The nurse informed me that there was nothing anyone at that hospital could do to help me, but that they had written a referral to Johns Hopkins; if anyone could help me, she said, they could. In the mean time, there was a crack between my sinus and my brain that could let more air in. She told me to not exert or strain myself in any way, to avoid sneezing, and to never, under any circumstance, blow my nose.

5

I don’t remember much of our drive back to Maryland—I had not slept at all the night before and the stress caused by the whole debacle had further drained me of energy, so I drifted in and out of consciousness. I think I spent that night in my own bed before going to Johns Hopkins in the morning. Once at Johns Hopkins, I remember being transferred between departments over and over again, and being examined and placed through various imaging devices multiple times—it was all a blur, rather surreal. There was a tangible chance that death was imminent for me, and although I definitely wanted to live, at the same time I think I was preparing myself to let go.

As it turned out, by the time I got to Hopkins, the air had already started to recede from my brain. The doctors explained that the big risk now had to do with my sinus. There was a chance that due to the nature of my injury, I could wind up being stuck with an incurable and non-stop migraine headache for the rest of my life. I probably would have seriously considered opting for death if given a choice between the two. Traditionally, the doctors would have preformed a very extensive and invasive surgery that would have involved peeling back my forehead and filling my sinus with fat. However, the doctor said that there was a chance that, if left to its own means, my body might heal itself properly. This sounded nice, and although I wasn’t too keen on risking death or immitigable migraine, I wanted to avoid surgery if at all possible. I decided to trust it would be healed without event.

While at Hopkins I received a very large card from everyone at the retreat, wishing me well. Also, because I stayed there a few nights, I had to call in to my boss at the college and call off work. I casually apologized and told her that I wouldn’t be able to make it because I had broken my skull. We still get a kick out of that phone conversation.

Within a week the swelling had completely disappeared, and I noticed with fascination that if I pressed lightly on my forehead above my left eye I could feel the broken sections of bone grating against each other. I loved telling that to people and watching their reactions. I was restricted from strenuous activity in any form for a few months and was still highly discouraged from blowing my nose or sneezing, but it healed well. My brother, having received the blow on the strongest part of his forehead, and with the impact being softened by the fact that my bones had given way a bit, had gotten off with nothing more than a bump on his head. It did not even discolor.

I have told this story many times to many different people since that retreat, and have in doing so discovered things about myself I may not have realized before. Although I appreciate the sensationalistic value of such traumatic, near-death injury stories and fully capitalize on this to hold my audiences captive, I have realized upon retrospection that actually experiencing it first hand was much different, much less dramatic than what I may have expected. From the time I ran into my brother to the time my life resumed normalcy, I took every big and threatening new development in stride and accepted it. There was a peace in being absolutely helpless and unable to control my fate. For me, the big stuff didn’t seem like a big deal—it was just what had been dealt me. It was the little stuff that irked me. Having to deal with that bloody nose and the prospect of having to walk around with that black eye irritated me. It is the little things in life that have always had a way with me—the irksome, the irritating, the uncomfortable—those are the things I struggle to accept and get over. I want to get to the point where I can accept doing that next little, irritating task that needs to get done just as easily as I could accept having air in my brain.

to walk: v. to move by placing one foot firmly the ground before lifting the other

my plans are full
of verbs
empty like the vines
of a winter vineyard
that cannot remember
the fulfilling weight of fruit

my dreams are the wings
of icarus
falling apart
in the void
over deep waters

in the darkness
gnashing jaws
gnaw
like tityo's vultures
on my spirit

but i open my eyes
pray
and plant my feet
on the floor

closer

i fall through membranes

of silken fire

horizons that blossom

to kiss my fingers

breathing warmth through me

as i plunge

into

the fragrant folds

of your many veils

I See You

I do not recall what the fight was over, only that our parents were gone and that it had escalated to where my little brother Daniel and I were furiously throwing small objects at each other. He was within my arms’ reach when he threw the eraser block and hit me just above the eye. My response was vicious. Before I could realize that I had picked my brother up, I had already slammed him onto the floor. I was terrified. As the haze of adrenaline melted away, I could not recall plucking him from the ground—but I my screaming senses could not help but recall the exertion with which I sent his prone body hurtling towards the floor. I collapsed to my knees next to him, crying his name. Daniel, Daniel…Daniel! Oh God why? As I turned him over, he moaned and began to regain consciousness, shivering from shock. I carried him to the couch, wrapped him in blankets, and called my parents. No, no, no! He had hit the thickly padded carpet with enough force to chip a tooth in half and cause minor head trauma. Minor, but I will always remember the terror. Later that day I walked out onto the deck with that eraser and threw it as hard as I could. I never saw it again.

How good and pleasant it is

when brothers live together in unity!

Psalm 133:1

I was probably around twelve or thirteen years old, which would have made him eight or nine, the day I challenged him to a long distance race. Needless to say, because of our age difference I always won sprints. However, physically outdoing my brother was not enough for me—I wanted to outsmart him as well. Already reveling in my victory, I challenged him to a race four times around our seven acre pasture. I added one stipulation: that we run in opposite directions. This way, I thought, he would not be able to tell exactly how far behind he was at any given time. I planned to alternate running and walking in order to conserve my energy, knowing that my brother—surely too young to grasp the concept of pacing—would be desperate to win and go all out. Once he lost wind in his valiant but naive effort, I would still have plenty in reserve and would be able to overlap him easily, dealing him a sound defeat. The race went well at first, but then things started to go wrong. He never stopped. Not once. By the second lap, I was falling far behind and my lungs were bursting in my chest, but when I looked across at him, watching desperately for any sign of tiring, all I could see was his thin little form jogging right along. I do not remember if he overlapped me or not, but my pride definitely suffered a most humiliating blow. I learned that day that my brother could run for a very, very long time, but I would not let go of my pride.

Be devoted to one another with brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:10

Daniel and I started playing piano on the same day. Immediately, I shot ahead of him in the lesson books, devouring the songs one by one on the way to mastery while he plodded along slowly. I quickly got to the level that our teacher asked if I wanted to learn a real song—Für Elise. I was ecstatic. I proudly worked for months learning and perfecting that song, getting to the point where I could play it with such emotion and feeling that I sounded great. I then graduated from high school early and went straight into college, leaving my piano lessons by the wayside. I came back to our piano every once in a while to play my song, and critiqued (read criticized) my brother’s playing constantly. Somewhere along the line he had started to experiment with the piano, and it often sounded terrible. However, he continued plodding through his lessons and continued to experiment, spending hours and hours on the bench filling the house with music. He was terrible at practicing his assigned songs—he would begin the song, and then would invariably digress along a musical rabbit trail that would last for fifteen minutes, often driving me crazy. Then he started sounding good. He also started writing down his music. Not long after that, he graduated and began going to college, excelling in music and music composition classes.

Sitting in the college’s recital hall transfixed by my brother’s music coming from the mouths of piano, bass, viola, cello, violin, French horn, and trumpet, I cannot help but be awed. Every now and again I find myself on the piano bench when my brother is not around, looking at sheet music and trying to play it. It is futile. After a few petty attempts at Phantom of the Opera or a random hymn, I start to play my song, Für Elise. Something about watching my hands make music, dragging a nostalgic beauty from the past, from my muscles, from my mind, is soothing. It is a feeling that I never want to lose. Maybe one day I, too, will be able to create music like my little brother.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. I Corinthians 13:4- 7

I once let my “intelligence,” my high IQ, my ability to do well in an academic setting, my early graduation, and so many other things distance me from my brother. Much of it was subconscious, but I am coming to realize more and more that I liked seeing myself as better than him, and that part of me, after all these years, still wants to see myself as better than him. What really hurts is that I can see now how much this has hurt him. The comparisons I established still haunt both of our lives.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Philippians 2:3

I am again the young teenager kneeling by his brother moaning on the carpet. It is too late to take back what has happened, but it is never too late to start healing wounds. Daniel, I am sorry. There is no need for me to compare myself to you or for you to compare yourself with me. I want to take that eraser and throw it as hard as I can, and I never want to see it again. I see you, my brother—I see you, respect you, and love you.

fear

the sun runs

its fingers

over the clouds

and music

lights the sky

stirring the heart

beat of the dark

earth

which strains

its hands upwards

whispering

shouting

into the music

encore

encore

encore

Praise be to the LORD my Rock,

who trains my hands for war,

my fingers for battle. Psalm 144:1

A month ago, when I would look up into the night sky and see the constellation of Orion, my spirit would ache inside me. A Chuisle mo Chroi, Kristina, has told me that when she looks up sees Orion she thinks of me, her warrior. A warrior--I have always been passionate about being a warrior for God. I yearn to put the same level of dedication and commitment into serving God as that Jonathan's unnamed armor-bearer put into serving his charge (I Samuel 14:1-14). I have always yearned to be the kind of man who would have climbed that cliff after Jonathan to face countless enemies.

In Christ, we can all be warriors in our everyday lives. I think that what made Jonathan and his armor-bearer consummate warriors was not their confidence in arms, but their confidence in God. There are countless incidents in the Bible in which ordinary men and women step up in unprecedented courage--take David, Hadassah, Paul, Deborah, Jeremiah, and Abigail for instance. These men and women saw what God called them to do and then did it, even if it may have seemed impossible. Think of what it would have taken to be a prophet like Jeremiah--to personally stand in the gap between God and an entire nation of hardened hearts. The prophets were often alone, one man set up by God to speak against an entire people. Can you imagine? Imagine yourself as Hadassah, placed into a situation in which not only your life and the lives of your closest friends, but the lives of an entire nation are all dependent on the success of one mission. No pressure, right? Sorta makes David and Goliath feel like a tea party. And yet she placed everything in the hands of God and laid her life and the lives of hundreds of thousands into God's hands. As immensely mind-boggling as her situation was, God is infinite in every way. If God is on our side, why should we be afraid? Especially when he has given us the promise of his presence? We are all called to be warriors, to be brave and undaunted in the face of the impossible. We are called to face the obscure mists of our futures with a resolute courage and faith, to stride into that 'huge' project that seems so impossibly daunting, to face the possibility of failure yet again. And we as warriors of God are promised victory.

The thing is, I have been struggling with an identity issue. When I would look up at Orion, I would not see myself--I would only see how far short I seemed to be of that ideal. My faith is so weak that I am overrun with fears of all kinds that wreak havoc in my life. But God never gives up. Ever. I had a terrible few months during which I could not remember what victory felt like. Can you relate? I had so many falls that I was losing hope completely. I felt so helpless--the Jars of Clay refrain "I have no fear of drowning; it's the breathing that's taking all this work" echoed in my head as I kept treading and spitting out water. Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil...

This month has been great. Actually, I would go as far as saying it has been the greatest month of victories I have ever had. For Thou art with me... God is always there when you are ready to rely on him and place your faith in His ability to turn you, yes, even you, into a warrior. On an interesting note, Proverbs 16:32 says: "Better a patient man than a warrior." Sometimes we might feel like Moses... things sure happened pretty slowly for him, but the good news is we are in God's hands and he knows just what he is doing. Life started to get better for me when I started to trust that God has my back--yeah, I knew he did already, but if knowledge+belief =action, I was sorta missing the middle part of the equation. Do you believe in your identity as a treasured son or daughter of God? Do believe in your identity as a warrior?

One of my favorite scenes ever captured by film is from The Two Towers, when Gandalf releases Theoden from Grima's leechcraft. He advises Theoden, "perhaps your hands would remember their old strength better if they grasped you sword." When he grabbed hold of the sword, he became aware of the deceit that had sapped his strength and his identity as a warrior. He saw through the lies and found the truth. Grab hold of the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and break out of any lies that hold you captive--you are a warrior, a man or woman of action, a courageous fighter of valor. Fight the good fight today, and may the Lord be with you.

Forgetting who you are?

Psalm 23 Psalm 139 Romans 8:31-39 Galatians 5:1