There are many experiences that are alien to most people: walking on the moon, winning the big bucks lottery, being gashed by a grizzly bear, doing H, weighing 400 pounds, and having implant boobs.
Because my life tends to be introspective, devoid of untoward kink — and boob implant free — I'm curious to know what it's like to experience the unique and unusual (as long as it doesn't ultimately involve attending 12-step co-dependency meetings).
A quick-read paperback called "Esquire Presents: What It Feels Like" (Three Rivers Press) is a collection of dozens of first-hand accounts of real life experiences, physical exceptions and trauma survivals.
After reading these fascinating and often scary anecdotes, I got to thinking about my own long-ago cliffhanger that I'd like to boast about because of its genuinely heroic content. It happened at age 13, and was life threatening. But first some "Esquire Presents: Feels Like" samplings to set the mood.
Grizzly Attack: "She grabs my left arm, tearing the muscles and tendons, and tosses me in the air. Then she attacks my head as I'm airborne. All I can see is her open mouth. Her teeth are gashing my scalp and ear. I can hear her fangs grinding on my skull. I think, the next bite will kill me."
Tornado Terror: "The feel of a twister approaching is exactly the feel of a freight train approaching — that low, ever-louder howl and shuddering ground. I had gone through the trailer wall, been thrown 30 feet up into the tree, and then dropped to the ground, concussed and black and blue."
M-to-F Good Feel: "I can have sex and orgasm. It's functional in that way. The orgasms are different, though. The male has this orgasm and that's basically it. For a female, it's more of an on-going thing during the course of intercourse, more like a whole-body experience. As opposed to men — men have sex like dogs." (Arf!)
Compulsive Disorder: "Washing my hair would take an hour. Washing the front of my forehead, I would scrub it 60 times; it could never be 61. If I did anything an odd number, I'd have to do it all over again, despite how tired I might feel. The pressure to do it was constant and overwhelming. Like a voice saying, 'Do not stop.' Like a locomotive out of control."
And, finally, Me As Hostage at Samhat Market, mid-city Detroit, where I often earn money delivering groceries: Two guys walk up to the counter and pretend to look at smokes. They nervously check things out. One of them pulls a gun and yells at grocer Jimmy, "Your money, fast! I'd hate to shoot the kid."
Jimmy hesitates. I'm too stunned to blink. Grocer Mose, eating in a back room, quickly tunes in. Grabs his own gun. Fires a warning shot at the ceiling. Yells Arabic and English obscenities! Ayreh Feek! Telhas Teeze! You…!
And I quickly duck behind a stack of Maxwell House coffee cans. The crooks scatter.
Cops arrive. I give details, and later toss and turn at night. "No!" I tell anybody who'll listen, Burton School Elementary teachers and buddies. "I wasn't a bit scared, just slightly deaf in one ear."
Oh, yes! Those damn Esquire Boobs: "My implants aren't hard. They don't feel like basketballs. It's more like water balloons that aren't completely full. When you touch them you can feel the liquid inside, too, which I guess is weird."
You can't prove it by me, Cinderella. (The holdup also left my fingers perpetually heterosexually numb.)
One more Possible Terror 2016. Just to gauge your own on-a-scale-of-one-to-forever response. Headline! Donald Trump elected in a landslide! VP Sarah Palin, middle-fingers media! God only knows…
