The judge

When I was 12 years old my father took me to Disneyland. It was a grand adventure of castles, jungles and steamboats. I am not including space capsules in the mix because I did not happen to enjoy the space ride he took me on. Since that time, I have learned that if a ride has a sign outside of it with those stick people illustrations that says"WARNING to pregnant women, people with heart conditions, or recent surgery, it is kinda  like the black diamond on the ski slope hill for degree of difficulty in the world of amusement park rides. While they are at it they should include WARNING to people who barf easily, people who poop their pants on a whim, AND people who sometimes hate to cry in public.  My dad  told me it was one of those 3D theater type rides with lots of movement. Looking back, why did I believe him? It's not like he had a great track record.  He had tricked me into walking the  crevice around Crater Lake in Oregon in the rain , tricked me into  bicycling past a herd of buffalo in Yellowstone, and my personal favorite ,tricked me into thinking a tuna sandwich was really cheese. He obviously was not the most reliable leader.  What followed was what I determined hell must be like if I didn't start repenting. Forget the fire and brimstone! If we are all supposed to get our own special hell , mine would be to be surrounded by the pitch black, high motion with upside down loop de loops. There are scarier roller coasters than Space Mountain, but for a girl who hated surprises there could be no worse fate. Luckily, I did not morph into one of those stick figures on the sign and die or have a heart attack. I didn't even barf or poop my pants. However, I did cry in public.
Since that time many years have passed and I have not entered another roller coaster. I married an adrenaline junkie and gave birth to several of his cloned species, but they have  been unable to talk me into partaking of this "amusement" type activity.  I tell them to me it should be called " depression park " as it makes me so sick.  We have a deal that when I die, before the coroner pronounces me officially dead, my family gets to take me on a roller ride of their choosing and can display that picture they snap of you before you are going on the final descent on top of my casket.  
   There has,however,  been some use that has come from that horrific roller coaster Magic Mountain Ride from so long ago.  On weeks where I am having a bad time I have to tell myself, "at least I'm not on that ride where I thought I was going to die, we had the front car, and my dad is laughing his head off.  This week has been one of those weeks. A simple dental cleaning gave me half a day full of trigeminal nerve pain. If you have ever touched an electric fence inadvertently then you know what trigeminal nerve pain is like. "Zap" "zoing " "zonk". Only the Z letter of the alphabet is adequate for describing the level of shock felt with each zap. My training as an L/D nurse led me  to count the jabs in my face as contractions. I felt lucky that I only had about 6 jabs an hour. There was a time last December when the frequency was every 3 seconds for 2 days.  Just when I thought I was in the clear a new symptom developed. Well, I should call it a new "old symptom. The last time this hit was at Thanksgiving 2010 when I was eating turkey.

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