I have a smallpox scar. I have a smallpox scar from having smallpox stuffed into me with a needle by the government. I was five when the government gave me smallpox. Okay, they gave me a teeny, tiny speck of smallpox, but the scar is still ugly.

Since then, I’ve been inoculated, biopsied, C-sectioned, extracted, stapled, stitched, sliced and diced. And now I’m crazy. When I go to the doctor my CO2 levels go way up, because I’m hyperventilating, and when I go to the dentist my blood pressure sky rockets because my head is trying to explode my heart to get out of the appointment.

Oddly enough, getting sharp objects jammed into body parts does not get easier with time. Now, I have to be drugged out of my mind when I have sharp objects jammed into body parts.

I am a smallpox scarred, cancer kicking, dental floss surviving pansy.

For my latest dental session on Thursday (a procedure that I like to call drilling-for-oil-in-Linda’s-gums) my dentist and his gang gave me a sedative-hypnotic. It made me go to sleep for Thursday (the whole day, as in entire) and I didn’t get a chance to read the “medication guide” until AFTER the procedure.

What a hoot. Those medicine-warning labels are the funniest reading on earth, in my opinion. Who writes those things? They should win a contest.

Apparently, a side effect of taking a sedative-hypnotic can be something called “traveler’s amnesia.” This is a side effect that can cause someone to be (and I quote) “NOT fully awake and do an activity that they will NOT remember doing. Reported activities include: driving a car (sleep driving), making and eating food, talking on the phone, having sex, and sleep-walking.”

Since Thursday has disappeared from my memory, I have developed a vague sense of unease about my possible “travel amnesia” related activities.

What if, at some point during my missing Thursday, I put on a gypsy outfit, drove to the lakefront, and played a tambourine for loose change? What if I went horseback riding—naked? What if I drove my John Deere lawn tractor to the Florida Mall, so I could buy a pretzel, with salt? What if I kicked somebody really hard, wearing a gypsy outfit? (I mean me; I’d be wearing the gypsy outfit, not my hapless victim. I’m guessing.)

Traveler’s amnesia. Yikes.

What if I joined a motorcycle gang, got a tattoo of a teeny butterfly that’s really hard to check for without a hand mirror, and/or promised to be a drug mule?

What if . . .

Oh . . . hang on, wait a minute . . . there’s something here under the bedcovers, between the sheets. (Okay, I’m writing this in bed, in my pajamas. So? Besides, I might have a traveler’s amnesia flashback.)

Hey now . . . what the . . . almost got it . . . Well, look at that; it’s a tambourine, and there’s a buck twenty-three in it.

I can’t seem to find the gypsy outfit.

So, was I naked while playing the tambourine? Amnesia is so annoying.

— Linda (No More Cavities) Zern