This assignment from my Advanced Expository Writing class was a basic memoir paper. I decided to write about the first time I had sleep paralysis.
There was black fog encasing me. It sucked out all of the air from the room while leaving a static fume. This cloud crawls into my veins and creeps into my spine. Leisurely curling around my heart, it begins to squeeze this muscle until my chest sings with pain. It’s not allowing me to move, yell, or think coherently.
I am dead.
My mother was in the living room that was not even ten feet away from where I lie. I could hear her watching the opening of Walker: Texas Ranger. She’s probably eating lunch; a sandwich, potato chips, and a diet soda. Every now and then she laughs. Why does she not come in and ask if I’m hungry?
There is a crunchy blues guitar playing from the basement. My brother is in his own world, alive, improvising with an old beat-up six string. I can feel a vibrating pulse every time he hits a low E note. Why doesn’t he come in and ask me if I want to play?
My neighbor is mowing his lawn next to our house. My open window faces his yard, and I can smell the fresh cut grass and gasoline. I’m listening to him mow at one end of his backyard and work to the other side. Why doesn’t he come in and ask me for help?
At this point my heart starts pounding. I can feel it in my fingertips and my toes. The more worried I become, the harder my heart beats. I become relieved. I realize that I am not actually dead. Not “in the ground” dead, at least.
I start to wonder what the rest of my life is going to be like. I’m assuming my mother will come in sooner or later, asking me if I am going to get up. She’ll gently nudge my body and call my name. After she realizes I’m not responding, I’ll hear her scream. Or maybe she’ll softly say: “Oh my God…” I’m not sure.
“Zane!” will bounce off every wall in the house. My brother will come racing up the stairs, skipping two at a time. He’ll stop in my room and pant. Between his gasps of air, he’ll ask my mother “What’s wrong?”
She’ll tell him I won’t wake up. Zane will call 911 and I’ll be rushed to the town’s hospital. Once I go to the ER, they will stab my arms with needles, drawing blood and giving me IVs.
After the doctors realize I won’t wake up, they would tell my family that I’m a vegetable. I’d spend the rest of my life with a couple of hoses down my throat; one for oxygen and one for food. My mother would shave my face every other day and my brother would talk to me like I could hear him. I’d constantly be receiving flowers with notes and Facebook messages from friends that I can’t read.
After a month or two, people would forget about me. I’d be lying in a hospital bed, peaceful looking, until I die. That’s how I’d spend the rest of my life, until they decided to pull the plug.
But that isn’t happening and it won’t happen. I won’t spend the rest of my life eating from a tube. I promise myself I will eat greasy cheeseburgers, salty fries, and sugary sodas once more. I’m getting out of this for the burgers. The only problem is: how exactly do I get out?
I begin to yell as loud as I can. Shrieking at the top of my lungs, I know that someone will hear me. But, no matter how hard and loud I scream, I only hear my cries in my head.
The snake is clenching my chest tighter, as if warning me to not struggle. He laughs at me. Maybe this is what being dead feels like.
I’ve had a few friends and acquaintances that have almost died. One of my friends got flown from his car almost fifteen feet after hitting a deer. Another friend was on a motorcycle and wrecked on concrete; he lost so much blood they thought he wouldn’t make it. One friend was skiing and tumbled down the side of a mountain; he was flown out of the ski resort.
I realize that I envy them. In their moments of the accident, when they think they are dying, they have a chance to tell their story. They could let people know their thoughts. They would tell their girlfriends that they love them, their moms not to worry, and they could try to joke with their dads.
I skipped that part. I went straight to dead. I would have loved to be flying through a windshield thinking “Oh shit!” At least I would have died an exciting way. Dying in your sleep is for the elderly.
My tear ducts should be working right now. Tears should be falling from my face, but my body won’t even let me do that. This is one of the only times I wish I could cry. Blubbering like a drunk might alert someone.
Telling myself to calm down, I begin to breath slower. After a few moments, I began to feel the snake loosen his grip. It dawned on me that if I can still control my stomach for breathing, surely I could move other muscles.
Pushing my thoughts from my mind, I focus all of my energy on my right hand. My brain sends the neuron signals to clench my fingers. My brain fires these signals over and over, refusing to let my hand remain stagnant. Nothing happens.
I begin to chuckle in my mind as a thought clanks around: “So what?”
I don’t know why I find this so funny, but I laugh so loud, I’m sure that my mother can hear it. Of course she can’t. Some times I used to think that my mom could read my mind.
I tell my right hand to only move its index finger. That is simpler. While my brain is telling my dead nerves to move in my finger, my skull begins to rattle with my silent laughter. I forget that I’m comatose for a moment.
All of the sudden, I feel the fabric of my sheets on my fingertip. It is slight, but there. It’s cold to the touch, and my finger barely moves across it.
The snake releases its grip, and my body unlocks. My eyes flick open. A sharp breath fills my lungs and I sit upright. I’m groggy, but I can move. I guess I am alive.
Putting my glasses on, I slowly open the door and look into the living room. Walker: Texas Ranger hasn’t even reached its first commercial break. After I stand in my doorway with my mouth wide open, my mom looks my way and asks me a simple question:
“Are you hungry?”
