There’s something you should probably know about me. Given the quality of the writing around here and all, you’ve probably already figured this out, but just in case it somehow slipped past your radar:
I’m an idiot.
About 14 years ago, I was in the Navy. I graduated from high school a year or so before, didn’t have any job prospects, didn’t have the grades/money to get into a decent school (and, being 89th generation white trash, didn’t know the first thing about that whole admissions process thing, or financial aid). Once Star Trek: The Next Generation went into its winter hiatus, well, what other choice was there?
So I enlisted, thinking I would earn some money for school, see the world, etc. They offered me a signing bonus and, because I can add, let me into the nuclear power program. Being a big fat nerd, the idea of learning all about nuclear reactors and the possibility of getting my Homer on made me all tingly.
One day, during one of my physics classes in Nuclear Power School, I got in a little tiff with the instructor. Can’t remember the exact details, but we managed to piss each other off somehow and, out of frustration, my wee little 19 year old brain determined it would be a good idea to break my pencil over my forehead. He chose… poorly.
After I cracked the pencil on my gigantic melon, I looked down and noticed that the thing was still in one piece. Not even a little crack along the side. A little disappointed, I figured it was a sign that I needed to chill the fuck out, so I decided to get back to taking notes.
Problem.
The lead disappeared. No sign of it anywhere.
Then it hit me, like a pencil to the forehead.
I reached up and touched the spot where pencil and head collided. Sure enough, there was a lump there that wasn’t there before.
“Oh, fuck. I just stabbed myself in the head with a pencil.”
I tried to work the lead out in my seat, but it wouldn’t budge. I raised my hand and tried to get the instructor’s attention to excuse myself, but after our previous encounter, she decided she wouldn’t have any of my shenanigans and ignored me.
Desperate, I told the guy in charge of our class that I was running to the head (that’s fancy Navy talk for “the pisser”). I walked down the hall and parked in front of the mirror, in awe of my own retardation.
I tried everything I could to literally get the lead out. Pushed, pulled, pinched. Squeezed my head like a zit. No luck. The tapered piece of lead was acting like a suction cup inside my skin, holding it in place.
Then things got interesting.
As I was squeezing my head and cursing myself, one of the Chiefs in the school walked in on me.
Me: Hello, Chief.
Him: Good morning. Problem?
Me: Well, um, seems I have a piece of pencil lead stuck in my head.
Him (angry): Pencil le… What the hell happened? Who the hell did this to you?
Me: Yeah, well… Um… I kinda did it myself… The lead broke off and…
Him (concerned): Oh… oh! Now, don’t worry. It’s gonna be ok. Whatever happened, it’s going to be ok. I know it’s stressful and all, but it’s not worth hurting yourself.
Me: Hurting myself? Wait, no! Not like that, it was an accid…
Him: Really, don’t worry. Here, come with me. I’ll take you over to sick call. It’s gonna be ok, ok?
The Chief walked me over to sick call, the Navy equivalent of the nurse’s office, and told the corpsman on duty all about my affliction. The corpsman tried all the scientific procedures I’d already attempted in the head (pushed, squeezed, pulled, etc.), then decided my condition was beyond his abilities. He referred me to the hospital.
So my Chief bodyguard escorted me over to the Navy hospital on the base and, again, told everyone who’d listed about what happened. A nurse walked me to a private room and asked me to wait for a doctor to come and take care of me.
A few minutes later, the doctor came in and gave me a shot of some kind of local anesthetic in the forehead. Clearly, he already spoke with the Chief before coming to see me because he was giving me the “don’t worry, it’s going to be ok” treatment, too.
After the shot, I calmly explained to the doctor what really happened, that I wasn’t some depressed sailor who’d tried to commit suicide by stabbing himself in the head with a pencil, but rather a retarded sailor who’d done so accidentally.
He looked at me for a moment, trying to decide which story to believe.
Then he made his decision.
He left me sitting on the table, waiting for the anesthetic to kick in. Then he found every person available in the hospital and had every single one of them walk into the room to mock the idiot with the lead stuck in his head. Fun, fun, fun times.
After about 15 minutes of oh-my-God-you’re-fucking-stupids and what-the-fuck-kind-of-idiot-stabs-himself-with-a-fucking-pencils, the doctor came back in, warmed up his scalpel, and cut the MIA piece of my writing utensil out of my head. I walked back to class and got to explain to everyone exactly where I’d been for the past hour or so.
And fourteen years later, I still see The Dot every morning.
