"Forth he fared at the fated moment"

Let me tell you about the time I was buried alive…

I went to the imaging center in the Medical Mall to get my first ever MRI done. You see the warranty on my back had expired (turning 30 and all that) so naturally it stopped working. Then my right leg said “If he don’t work then I don’t either.” So two important pieces of the system went wonko for a couple days till I got the nice prescription NSAIDs to make it better for the time being. All in all, a very lame thing to have happen.

I go to get the MRI done and have to fill out this form making sure I have absolutely no metal bits in my body, or even tattoos on my eyelids. The fire extinguishers even have signs above them saying “Non-metallic Fire Extinguishers Only.” It all creates a sort of creepy mood. I wonder if anyone could have inserted metal into my body without my knowledge. I go into the big room to lay down on the table and be sucked into the machine. A nice lady put headphones on me (heavily insulated of course) and slowly fed me to the machine. I immediately get uncomfortable as I realize how small the hole is that I’ll be in. I won’t be able to move till they pull me back out. I hold my hand up and say “Whoa, uh can I slide in feet first from the other end. This doesn’t feel good.” The nice lady says “No.” Then she tells me that other people cover their eyes with a washcloth to make it easier and I agree to that. The insertion begins in earnest.

My heart is beating very fast because I feel how tight the chamber is even though I can’t see it. I force myself to think of good things. Rebecca. Emily. However my brain always zooms in on a piece of metal in the image and tears everything to shreds.

I try to think about the nice lady and how I can hug her when this is all over. The headphones had just aired a short report about how hugs reduce stress and help you live longer. It doesn’t work because I can’t wait for relief.

I try to focus on the music but it’s very quiet and the machine is thunking very loudly. I can feel my hands heating up. (Is that were they clandestinely inserted the metal?) I’m trying to stay still but my heart is beating so fast and hard.

The technician speaks to me through the headphones telling me when the next test will begin and how long it will be. The first three are around a minute and a half. Then he says this one should be the last one and it’s FOUR AND A HALF minutes. I’m half way through the test and I’m getting dizzy and it feels like I’m falling.

I open my eyes and stare at the washcloth to make the feeling go away. Only now I feel how cramped the space is so I close my eyes till the vertigo is too much.

Open. Close. Open. Close.

How much longer? I’m on the brink of yelling and pulling myself out of the maw. When it stops and I anxiously say “OK?” and he says he’s done and slowly retracts the table from the machine I’ve come to affectionately refer to as Grendel. That my friend is the time I learned I am uncomfortable in small places I can’t escape. Listening: Displaced - Azure Ray