Time Flies when you're Having a Seizure

Stuffing a Tahoe full of the Deans family and a week’s worth of belongings and then taking a road trip from North Carolina to Florida is about as crazy as trying contain a pack of rabid hyenas.  Outbursts of uninhibited rage are common and are usually followed immediately after by fits of raucous laughter. The sounds of the wild are punctuated by rare periods of eerie, suspenseful silence. 

On our most recent adventure to the Florida Keys, the chaos began before we even departed.  My sister, Melanie, is not a light packer.  She deliberated for hours about what to bring, and when she couldn’t decide, she just packed everything she owned.  She brought it all out to the living room so our dad could pack the car.

When he saw all her clothes, Daddy shook his fists and let out a maniacal laugh-cry that can only be described as a seizure.

Seizure drawing by Robby Deans

Thus began our journey.

The trip to Florida was largely uneventful, other than the occasional fit on our Dad’s part.  Any time the radio happened to scan upon a particularly “stupid” song, or if he was cut off in traffic, or if the GPS led him into a wrong turn, or if my sister and brother and I started to laugh too loudly, he would yell and jerk the wheel, and our car would veer dangerously out of our lane. Soon it became a game to predict when his next seizure would occur.

No one expected that the next furious outburst would be from everyone but Daddy.  Our dear father is a sail-car enthusiast, and he had spoken with a guy he found on E-bay about meeting him in Florida to purchase a new mast.  What he didn’t tell us was that he hadn’t spoken to the E-bay guy in over a year and that the mast store was well off our planned route, on the other side of the state. 

On the way, we took a brief hiatus at a beautiful, natural clear-water spring called Alexander Springs; however, in the fifty-yards of swimmable water, there were about 3,000 tourists already swimming, so we continued on our quest for the E-bay mast guru.  When we finally arrived in the town where his store was likely to be, Mr. E-bay did not answer his phone.  My dad had no idea where the store might be—or if it did, in fact, exist.  You can imagine our frustration. 

This time, it was our turn to seize, and we did so loudly and collectively. 

When we finally arrived at our destination, we were extremely grateful for the night of rest we were about to receive. It was the first moment of blissful silence we had experienced since our departure from North Carolina.  Melanie and I fell asleep as soon as we hit the bed.  Sometime in the night, however, I was jolted awake by a very frightened sister.

She had apparently dreamed that she was home and I was some dangerous intruder sleeping next to her.

“Melanie, we’re in FLORIDA!” I yelled.  But her face told me she didn’t believe that just yet.  I thought she was going to hit me again and I prepared myself for another assault, but awareness crept sleepily into her eyes.  She turned over and slept serenely as if nothing had happened. 

One of the most terrifying events of our trip happened when we were scuba diving at a reef called Hen and Chickens.  It is so named because the arrangement of coral resembles a mother hen surrounded by her baby chicks.  Its name evokes a sense of maternal protection, and it seemed safe enough: the reef was shallow and beautiful, and the water was amazingly clear.  As we were diving, we were delightfully unaware of the danger that loomed above us.  A smack—nay, an army—of jellyfish had gathered near the surface, and they waited with tentacles shivering in anticipation for our exposed skin to come nearer.

We didn’t have a chance.  Panic ensued as we all tried to board the boat via a small platform next to the motor.  Melanie cut her leg on one of the platform’s bolts as the rest of us squirmed around helplessly.  It was an outright massacre and the jellyfish emerged victorious.

We sped back towards the marina in dangerously stormy conditions, trying to follow a GPS that was as lost as we were. We were cold, stung, and being pelted by rain that felt like sand.  This time, everybody had a seizure.

The rest of our time in the Keys was fun and without major disaster.  It wasn’t until we were driving back north towards home that our dad’s next outburst occurred.  Melanie and I were singing songs by the Backstreet Boys a cappella, and we got a little too excited. 

 Daddy seethed for a good hour and a half, and we wanted to stop laughing, but his seizure face was just so funny.  We took turns drawing it on the back of the map of Florida.  Robby’s illustration was the best.

On our last night on the way home, we decided to stay at the cheapest place we could find.  It was a bad decision.  At first, we were pleasantly surprised by the cleanliness of the building.  The outside was quite nice for a cheapest-you-can-get kind of place.  But when we got to the door to our building, this is what we encountered:

This creeper was blocking the door, just waiting to murder us with the rusted butcher knife he almost certainly had concealed in the back pocket of his cargo shorts.  He was talking on his cell phone.  His shirt was open, revealing a large, protruding beer gut.  His feet were bare.  Why was he standing in front of the door?  Was he staying in the hotel, or was he just hanging out there?  To whom could he be talking? An accomplice, perhaps?  Where were his shoes?  And why, in God’s name would he let his hair look like that?

The creeper stood dangerously close as we all filed into the building.  We clutched our bags and held on for dear life.  I scanned the lobby area for potential weapons to use against him.  My mom was the last one in.  As she tried to shut the door behind her, the creeper grabbed it.  The only way to get into the building was to scan your room key.  The creeper was obviously a murderer, and everyone knows that murderers don’t bother with room keys.  She pulled as hard as she could, but the creeper was too strong. 

  He made it in and reached slowly and deliberately into his cargo shorts.  We all froze, wide eyed.  Without saying a word, he pulled out his room key to show us that he did, in fact, stay in the hotel.  He followed close behind us as we found our room.  We had just gotten to the room when he dropped his key on the floor.  I braced myself, just waiting for the rusty knife to come flying out, but he simply picked up his key card and moved on.  It was the last any of us ever saw of him, except for Melanie.  That night, she dreamed the creeper had broken in and was attacking us.

That's what it's like to go on a Deans family vacation.  And even though our vacations are like an insane asylum residents’ field trip, each one of them is always more fun than the last.  After all, what would a vacation be without a seizure or two?