I’m going to start taking Thursday’s off and rehearse for the upcoming Marty Monologues show at The Westcott Room in the Owens Design Group building in Chillicothe. All the details for that show are over at the MM facecrack page which you can visit by clicking here.
I thought for the next few weeks leading up to the show, I’d write some short stories about my experiences doing the Marty Monologues shows over the last two years. So here’s this week’s Thursday Minute Marty Monologue Tale!
(Almost) A Sheer Heart Attack! - Part One
The first Marty Monologues show happened on September 30th, 2018 at the Apollo Theatre in downtown Peoria. I had never done something like this in my life and I was terrified. As time got closer I kept wondering what in the actual fuck I had gotten myself into. We pre-sold tickets and I didn’t think anybody would buy one and then I wouldn’t have to do the show.
Much to my surprise we sold 82 tickets, I couldn’t believe it and it just made it even more nerve-wracking. These people bought tickets to a show which they thought I could pull off and I had big doubts about it. Every day that came closer flop sweat would run down my face if I thought about it.
There was one other thing going on, there was a chance I might have a full-blown heart attack on stage. Let me explain.
That summer I started noticing a dull pain in the middle of my chest if I was walking fast or exerting myself physically. The pain sometimes traveled to my neck and partially down my arm. I would stop what I was doing, breathe deeply and it would go away. There’s a history of heart problems in my family and I was hoping I wasn’t going to join the club.
Sometime in the second week of September, I was taking the trash to the dumpster in the parking lot of my apartment building and I had a really bad pain in my chest. I dropped the bag and sat on a parking block and it lasted for what seemed like an eternity. Finally it stopped, I threw the trash in the dumpster and started walking back to my apartment and got another sharp pain. Now I’m thinking I’m having a heart attack and I got in my car and drove to St. Francis Hospital, went to the emergency room and told the nurse behind the counter I was having bad chest pains.
I learned one thing, when you tell the emergency room nurse you are experiencing bad chest pains you go to the front of the line ASAP! They put me in wheelchair, wheeled me near a machine and two nurses started putting round discs on my chest and stomach.
I asked what was going on and one of the nurses told me they were going to give me an EKG test to see if I was having a heart attack.
“Shit, I forgot to study for this,” I jokingly shot back. They both laughed and put more discs on me and in about five minutes the test was al done.
I got wheeled into another room and they told me to lay down on the bed and try to relax and a doctor would be in soon with the results of the test. So that’s what I did. I noticed as I was laying there that the pain was gone. I was hoping that maybe this was a false alarm.
My hopes were lifted when a doctor came in the room holding a clipboard.
He said hi and told me that the EKG looked fine and I wasn’t having a heart attack. Whew! He then told me that they wanted to monitor my heart for a half an hour, just to see if there was any irregularities happening.
So then I was back in the wheelchair and got wheeled to yet another room and a nurse put a clip on my finger and there was a monitor where you could see my heart rate and some other things I didn’t really understand.
“Okay,” she said, “just lay there, relax and try not to move around a lot. Can I get you anything?”
“You wouldn’t have any vodka or heroin would you? It might help pass the time,” I jokingly asked.
She laughed and said she’d take a look around for me and then walked out of the room and shut the door.
After about 15 minutes the nurse came back to check in on me and I said, “You’re empty-handed, well, we don’t need to check the results of the test, my heart is officially broken!”
“Well, I’m sorry about that, but glad you’re in good spirits,” the doctor will be back in about fifteen minutes,” she told me while smiling at my smart-ass remark.
I thanked her and sure as shit on a shingle, fifteen minutes later the doctor came in.
He had his trusty clipboard with him and he sat on a stool.
“Everything looks fine,” he told me, “but since these pains have been recurring, I’d really like you to spend the night so we can monitor you and take a stress test in the morning.”
“I really can’t do that,” I told him. “I have to do a TV show tomorrow morning.”
He looked at me funny and said, “What TV show is that?”
“It’s a morning show called Good Day Central Illinois. I have a bi-monthly segment where I go on and talk about my blog,” I explained.
He gave me a weird look and said, “What’s your blog about?”
“It’s called Meanwhile Back In Peoria and it’s all about me running around and going to places in and around Peoria. Today I thought I might be able to do a post about having a heart attack in Peoria, but I guess that isn’t going to happen yet,” I replied.
He laughed and said, “I really suggest you cancel the show and let us monitor you so you can take the stress test first thing in the morning.”
“I appreciate your concern, but I’m not going to do that, I don’t want to cancel this late. Can’t I just schedule the stress test for tomorrow afternoon?” I asked.
He shook his head and looked at me like I was kind of nuts and said, “Well, you can call your doctor and have them schedule one, but I suggest you do it soon and until then try and take it easy.”
I thanked him and shook his hand and then left and drove back home. I was hoping this whole thing was a false alarm and that it was just anxiety from worrying about the upcoming Marty Monologues show.
Well, in a few days, I would find out that maybe it wasn’t a false alarm after all.
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Tune in next week for part two of (Almost) A Sheer Heart Attack! Have a lovely and fun Thursday. The weekend is almost here but we’re still in the middle of a fucking pandemic, so who cares? But try and have a good day in spite of that!
Artwork & Design by Chelsie Tamms of Lettering Works.
Related Post: Sunday Night @ The Apollo Theatre: The Marty Monologues.