I would make a poor matador.

Last Saturday I checked into the unconscious hotel for minute or two. I was just starting to enjoy my stay, flying in the clouds, when I awoke to a mouthful of dirt. My dad was holding my head, mumbling desperate prayers to Jesus, asking me if I knew where I was.

“The ranch?” I heard someone answer back. I couldn’t tell if it was my voice or someone else’s, but it sounded feminine. I wanted her to shut up. She was making a lot of unpleasant groaning sounds. She was trying to check me out of my 5-star hotel in the sky— pulling me into a dark cave.

At her urging, I half-heartedly started spelunking for my body. I was reluctant to reunite with whatever was happening to my fleshy little blob down on earth- lying there in the corral alley, apparently eating dirt and pennies.

Next thing I knew, Dad and Calvin got me into the passenger side of the feed truck. Dad started driving in the NASCAR championship cup series — 3 miles of gumbo dirt road to the highway. By then my soul and body were one again, but my hearing was on par with an elderly person with bifocals. My vision was like looking through an elderly person’s bifocals: really blurry. All I could think about was how much I love to see. I kept saying, “I love to see dad I love to see.” Dad held my hand and reassured me I would be able to see sometime soon. I thought about what a beautiful day I had seen before the day’s festivities and felt calm again. I mean, if this was the last day to see clearly, at least it was a beautiful one.

Dad, Calvin, and I spent all day riding. We were herding some bulls that were in with the cows. Once we got them into the corral, we started to load them in the trailer. Right then, two of them got on the fight. When bulls get on the fight, they aren’t very coordinated, or considerate. They crashed into the fence then crashed into the steel gate my noggin was behind. Calvin said he picked me up from the ground, only to stagger off and pass out again.

I don’t know if it was dad’s driving or being hit in the head, but somewhere along that 40-mile trek to the ER, I felt like throwing up. Dad kindly sacrificed his pro NASCAR career to pull over and frantically attempted to punch my husband’s phone number. I knew my vision was improving when I saw something that looked more like multiple credit card numbers than Nathan’s phone number on his iPhone screen. Despite my best efforts to teach him, dad has never mastered the convenience of telling siri what to do. I grabbed the phone and told siri to call Nathan up. Dad then proceeded to call my sister in Atlanta, then my mom, then the entire town of Belle Fourche to meet us at the hospital for my welcome back to earth party in the ER. Despite driving 90 miles per hour, we didn’t get pulled over by the cops. Which was good because I never bothered to put current 2023 plates on the feed truck.

The hospital was good to me. They somehow found my pitifully small veins and hooked me up to an IV, gave me a tetanus shot, MRI, as well as not just one, but TWO blankets. I stared at my mismatched socks as the doc sewed up my head.

I should also mention that I was crying a lot. I don’t even know why but I sure was. Crying and shaking like a lunatic. Don’t worry, dad documented it well.

After a few hours, I finally got to my reception party in the ER waiting room. I hadn’t had this much attention since my wedding day. McDonald’s even catered the event. I ate greasy french fries and chicken nuggets until I felt nauseous again.

All jokes aside, this little incident made me much more aware of my mortality. I’m going to try to stop wasting this fully functioning cranium on bad reality TV shows, twitter, and tiktok. When my concussion decides to leave me, I’m going to read more books, write more poems, and spend more time with the folks in the waiting room.

In Closing…

For all its ethereal beauty, the ability to fly, and the soft cloud pillows, I wouldn’t much recommend a stay at the unconscious hotel. It’s pretty expensive…You’ll need a big steel gate and at least a couple of 2000 pound bulls. (Try finding a decent bull right now for under four thousand dollars.) Also, emergency room visits aren’t cheap. Get some decent health insurance first and make sure you have good crew ready for you in the ER waiting room.