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Velociryx
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of Candle'Bre
Apr 1999
time: 05:21
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I travel….It’s what I do. There is a restless gypsy spirit that stirs ‘round in my blood and prompts me to always seek what lies just over the horizon. Had I been born in another age, it is quite possible that I’d have been an explorer, tromping gleefully through the virgin wilderness of the New World. Thoughts like those never cease to put a smile into these weary eyes, and breathe a bit of new life into this weary soul.
I treasure each and every one of the adventures I’ve had, too. Even the ones that ended in disaster (and more than a few of them have)…they’re all special to me. They all taught me some or other invaluable lesson.
Getting married early in life (TALK about a disaster LOL!) taught me what not to do, so the next time I get married, I’ll get it right.
The eight-day stint in New Orleans and the week-long search for my car taught me to think on my feet, even when (thanks to the power of Absinth) they were barely beneath me.
Wandering through, and then sleeping in the Valley of the Gods in the dead of winter when I felt that my whole world was falling apart taught me that strength and determination flows through my veins, and that I really AM okay.
The incident with the mated pair of moose at the Continental Divide showed me that God has many faces, and he appears at the most unexpected times.
Thanks to a late night phone call, I learned that a man with a baseball bat can do an enormous amount of damage to a Ford Ranger, and that it’s entirely possible to execute a passingly good J-Turn in reverse, even when you’re really sleepy.
Getting lost in the Bayou country….well…taught me to run away from snakes and not a lot else, but you get the idea. And there are so many more.
Among my favorite stories though, is the incident at Devil’s mountain, because it had such long-lasting, far-reaching impacts on my life.
I was young and crazy…23 years old…recently divorced, lost everything I had, dropped out of school for a while to get my head on right again, just knocking around the country, working odd-jobs to stay alive and pay for the next tank of gas.
Found myself in west Texas…Big Bend area.
Traveled through a little town called Pine….springs? Pine Flats? Well, it was Pinesomethingorother. You can find it on the map, but it’s not much more than a speck.
Anyway, the TOWN of Pinewhateverthehell isn’t all that noteworthy…not much more than a narrow spot in the road…most of the town is built right on the shoulders of the two lane road that runs through it….maybe three or four hundred people in the greater metropolitan area. You get the picture.
Nahhh, but the most interesting aspect of the place was the mountain that sat nearby.
Devil’s Mountain.
Now with a name like that, do you really think I could resist getting out to have a little climb?
Devil’s Mountain isn’t really much of a mountain. Glorified hill, would be a more apt description. But it was a fun climb…middle of July, hotter than ten kinds of hell outside, nobody up there but me. I loved it.
Took me about four and a half hours to reach the summit, and once I did, I sat at the top on a big rock outcropping, guzzling Gator-Aid and dusting off my shoes.
That’s when I found out WHY Devil’s Mountain was called…well…Devil’s Mountain.
It’s on account of all the scorpions.
I saw the little sucker coming, too. He scurried out from under a little ledge, and made straight for me.
Ever had one of those dreams where you knew you had to get your butt in gear, but couldn’t quite make it happen?
Yeah well…that was me…big lug with a stupid look on my face, trying to move my hand out of the way but just wasn’t quite fast enough.
The sting woke me up though, lemme tell you, and HURT!? Oh my GOD did that burn!
Now…I’d like to tell you that I was all stoic about it, and chewed on a few rocks as I trudged calmly back down the mountain, but that ain’t what happened.
No…what really happened was that I hopped around like a dead chicken (who also happened to be cussing like a sailor), yelping at the top of my lungs.
To my credit, I did remember to stomp the little devil flat, which didn’t do anything at all to remedy the problem, but it made me feel some better. 
Anyway, it was my virgin experience at being stung by a scorpion, and I didn’t know what to expect. Was it lethal? I didn’t know.
I DID have an expansive background with horror movies though, and many of those movies featured giant bugs, so of course, my imagination wasted no time in coming up with all sorts of gruesome ends for myself if I stayed up on the mountain.
Clearly then, staying on the mountain was not an option, but getting down was proving somewhat tricky, cos my right hand was quickly becoming less than useless.
I say less than useless because it was swelling rapidly, throbbing like a sonofa*****, and hurting like you wouldn’t believe. No way could I use it for anything…not even grabbing the occasional rock or tree branch.
My first thought was to suck the poison out. I’d seen McGuyver do something like that once, so why not?
Took out my knife and carved a thin line through the wound and did my best to imitate Barnabas Collins.
Yuck.
And to make matters worse, it didn’t really seem to help. Still have the scar though. Right next to the catch-the-weed-eater-aimed-at-my-face scar. They make a lovely pair, actually.
But…I’m a clever lad, and I thought I had discovered a means of getting down the mountain, despite not being able to use my right hand.
Trouble was, I wasn’t sure if the solution would be worse than the current situation or now.
After considering though, I decided that worst case, I’d wind up with a couple of broken bones using my oh-so-creative idea for emergency mountain egress, and I really didn’t know WHAT to expect from the scorpion venom, so that’s what did it. Got me moving.
So…I sad down and slid.
The upshot was, I made it to the base of Devil’s Mountain in about ten minutes.
The downsides were….manifold.
First, I hurt in places I didn’t even know you had nerve endings! OUCH! Didn’t think anything was broken, but still….
Second was that the backside of my jeans were pretty well nonexistent.
Oh well, I was down in one piece and still kicking, so that had to count for something, right?
Gingerly dusted myself off, hobbled over to the car, and made for the little general store (which also pinch-hit as the post office) I had passed on my way to the mountain.
The guy behind the counter looked at me strangely when I walked through the door, all dust covered, and with the arse-end of my jeans conspicuously missing, but when I explained my situation, he only nodded sagely.
I purchased some Jim Beam, rubbing alcohol, and a roll of gauze, and did my best to dress the wound in the bathroom (after killing the bottle of Beam), then asked the guy behind the counter if there was a doctor open in the area.
Sadly, it was Sunday afternoon, and there were no doctors in the vicinity that had office hours on the Sabbath, but he DID tell me that there was a veterinary clinic open, and gave me directions to that. So it seemed that humans were pretty much S.O.L. if they got injured on Sunday, but man’s-best-friend could get a shot of TLC…interesting.
So off I went to the Vet clinic, and wouldn’t you know it, but the little veterinary assistant was about the cutest thing I’d ever seen….figured that I was not exactly looking my best.
After she had a good giggle at the posterior portion of my jeans, she showed me to the vet’s office and he commended me on a fine dressing job on the wound.
Looked it over, and gave me three bottles of Dog Penicillin. Told me that it was the same stuff humans take, but not as strong, and to get a room and sweat it out of my system for a couple days, so that’s just exactly what I did, and I’m no worse for the wear, actually, for having taken Fido’s meds.
Well, except for chasing the occasional parked car, but that’s not so bad.
Anyways, fast-forward nine years. I’m 32, and my misadventure in Texas is a distant memory. I’m workin’ for a bank, living in a comfy little townhouse…life’s good.
I get every other Friday off at noon, and that suits me just fine. And on this particular day, I decide that a grease burger would be just the ticket to kick off the weekend celebration.
Fantastic! And as luck would have it, there’s a place I gotta pass to get home….so I stop, grab some grub, and home I go.
Take one bite of the sandwich and BAM! Stomach ache….and I’m not talking about a little runty tummy ache, either…I mean, this is the Big Kahuna of all stomach aches. Feels like there’s an alien in my gut trying to chew his way out.
Well that was about the last of the burger and fries, lemme tell you. I dropped it on the table and spent the next half hour just rolling around on the floor trying to escape the pain.
No dice.
So I force my mind to start working again. Ulcer? I heard milk was good for ulcers, and that might be what it is…given the low-stress life I lead and all, so sure. Let’s have milk.
Unfortunately, that made it worse.
The ol’ Internal Pain O’Meter is reading about a six on the ten-scale at this point, and I’ve got the sweats.
Figure maybe if I take some meds and sleep it off it’ll be better.
Pop some Tylenol PM and Pepto Bismol and wait for the drugs to kick in.
Six hours later, I’m still waiting, and now the pain meter is up to the mid sevens….hands are shaking and I know I can’t drive.
I can be a stubborn man, but I’d had about enough, by this point, and decided that whatever it was, it wasn’t going away on its own, so I called this gal I was dating…cute lil’ nurse named Marcie. She had just finished her shift at the hospital, and when she heard the tone of my voice, I guess she thought it was pretty serious, cos she made it to my house in about fifteen minutes, and it’s normally a thirty minute trip for her.
I could barely walk at this point, and she helped me into her car, and off we went to the hospital.
When the duty nurse saw me, pale, drawn, shaking visibly, half doubled over, soaked in sweat, the first thing he asked was “What has he been taking?” And that really ticked me off! I’ve not done any home chemistry experiments in YEARS, and I was offended by the suggestion. Had I been feeling up to par, I’d have taken him to task for it, but as it was, all I did was croak and groan in his general direction and grab my stomach.
Marcie translated as best she could and the filling out of much paperwork commenced. She had to do it, cos my hands were shaking too badly.
As for me…I wandered off to find someplace to lay down. My legs weren’t cooperating so well, and hadn’t been for a good while.
Almost made it to the benches, too, but at that moment, much to my shame, the dam inside my head broke, and I couldn’t take it any more.
I remember doubling over and then falling to the floor.
I remember the pain sweeping up over me so big and vast and all-consuming that it took everything away.
There was this detached portion of my mind still functioning, and I kept wondering what all the fuss and racket was….wishing that whomever was screaming would just shut up so I could rest.
Slowly, it dawned on me that I was the one doing the screaming.
That was the only thing left. There were no words. There was no reason or rationale. There was only the screaming, and let me tell you, I don’t care what anyone does to me for the rest of my life…that’s a kind of pain I would not wish on anyone. I could FEEL myself dissolving from the inside out.
Needless to say, that was about the end of the paperwork.
They got me back into the treatment room double time, and started running tests and tubes.
A nurse gave me a shot of something magical, and in an instant, the pain was gone. I could think. The screams stopped.
I took a deep breath to answer the flurry of questions by the medical staff, got perhaps two sentences out, and then WHAM! The pain returned with as much force as before. My words were choked off by the new scream in my throat.
Another shot.
Same effect. What beautiful relief.
Two sentences later and the pain returned. I vaguely remember the doctor present shouting to the nurse “Damnit, just give him the whole thing!”
And then…nothing. Floating. I could barely talk, I was so drugged, but at least there was no more pain.
I explained to them as best I could what had happened, and they ran all sorts of tubes.
Catheter, Trunk Line, IV’s….I was wired up!
Then they sat me up and said to me “’k….we’re gonna take this little black tube, shove it up your nose, down your throat and into your stomach, and while we’re doing this, we want you to drink this glass of water and say the alphabet to help the tube go down.”
Uh huh.
Needless to say, I was less-than-enthusiastic about participating in THAT particular game.
But up the nose and down the throat the tube went, and they were all over at the monitor babbling at each other, so I did what any self-respecting artist would do under such circumstances. I went to sleep.
I don’t remember much for several days after that, but according to family, I spent five days in ICU getting strong enough for the operation.
Acute Pancreatitus, was what they called it. Whatevertheheck that is.
Brought on by Gall Stones.
Six of them, blocking the pancreatic duct. Eat food, pancreas creates digestive juices, juices can’t get where they need to go on account of the blockage…pancreas starts to eat itself.
Lovely image, eh?
So that was the story, but it gets better.
There were questions raised.
Why didn’t the digestive juices eat through the blockage, for example, and then proceed normally.
And to answer those questions, they had the gallstones analyzed to find out what they were made of.
Ready for it?
Scorpion venom.
Six tiny, crystallized droplets of Scorpion Venom.
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20-10-2004 02:00
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