Approximately Three Plus Days Elapsed
Approximately three plus days elapsed...
without yours truly experiencing urge to defecate
Neither bloating nor constipation
arose, but one nondescript anguished
logophile anticipated intestinal blockage,
hence prophesying worse case scenario
I (predicated in direction for an adult)
ingested three Dulcolax tablets
and subsequently this joker
found himself riddled
with debilitating diarrhea dilemma
that afflicted me hours on end
today April 11th, 2022.
Severe **** travails
immediately brought forth
rectal recollections regarding
my offal bout with shigella
circa approximately July fourth holiday
nineteen hundred and eighty seven
which ranked as worst pain in the ****.
Two women (Ziona and Susan –
surnames unknown),
plus your truly, which trio
befriended each other
from Thursday night contra dance.
Aforementioned women
minimally identified
via first name basis
(since their sir nom de plume
unknown at this juncture),
and yours truly linkedin,
via above said social venue.
This piece of information mentioned
since that innocuous site
(Summit Presbyterian Church
at Green and Westview Streets
within Mount Airy, Pennsylvania)
essentially served as
figurative starting point
per following true anecdote.
Though about thirty five years ago,
my memory easily jogged,
asper unforeseen brush with death.
Innocence and naïveté twin factors,
tangentially contributed to agonizing ordeal.
Ask me what I ate for breakfast
this morning, and ye will receive
a blank stare!
Turn back the hands of time,
well nigh eighty percent
since existence sans mein kampf.
Every summer informal conclave
regarding congregation of hippies
(most of whom found me
looking conservative – fully attired)
decide upon a locale communicated
thru the grapevine.
The Rainbow Family Gathering
(vast majority opting to shuck clothes)
that summer held in Cheoah National Forest
just outside Robbinsville
western North Carolina,
and the farthest south
clandestine group congregated.
Among the estimated 12, 700 attendees
(one of whom included yours truly),
more than fifty percent
of the sprawling masses
contracted the near fatal
outbreak of shigellosis.
Sanitation in the expansive campsite
ranked as poor to non-existent.
This absence of proper hygiene
provided opportunities
thru contaminated food,
water and person
to person contact.
Widespread transmission
of the very opportunistic disease
caused by Shigella sonnei,
resistant to ampicillin,
tetracycline, and trimethoprim
sulfamethoxazole;
the rapacious organism
categorized as colicin type 9,
and contained a 90-kilobase plasmid,
not found in non-contagious related strains.
Misery loves company,
and this epidemic plagued
the infected with unrelenting diarrhea
and general lower
gastrointestinal debilitation.
Unsure how this then
late twenty something singular male
managed to weather
the microbial onslaught,
which rendered me prone
to a doubled over spate
of being lobbed and hamstrung
hammering the lower gastrointestinal tract,
and incessant severe loss of nutriment
vis a vis thru rectal a steady state
quintessentially unable to nourish
an already slim body.
Upon relieving chronic purging
from the sphincter muscle,
the sensation to expel
countless times thereafter
explained (not recommended diet)
the rapid loss of weight.
Whence returning home
at that time 724 Level Road,
Collegeville, Pennsylvania, 19426,
this ghostly appearance of mine
immediately alarmed, discerned,
and gauged family members
to schedule me for
immediate medical intervention.
After being examined,
(what little flesh remained
of what resembled
a Holocaust Concentration camp victim),
the physician could offer
no pharmacological remedy.
As the days of my life passed
under bedside and medical watch
of mother, who worked
as a licensed practical nurse,
yet could do little or nothing
to halt her own demise courtesy
metastatic carcinoma viz
ovarian/uterine cancer
approximately seventeen years ago
early May 2020.
Copyright ©
Matthew Harris
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