I AM HE-MAN! (And Apparently Spider-Man Too) Another Perfectly Normal Day in My Life*

I suppose most people have a heart attack and consider it a rather unpleasant experience. They panic, call an ambulance, get rushed into the hospital, and spend the next several days thanking God they're alive. Well, I never claimed to be most people. In fact, I've spent a considerable portion of my life demonstrating that I'm not. So naturally, when it came time for me to have a heart attack, I managed to turn the entire thing into something between a medical documentary, a superhero movie, and a comedy routine. And before anybody starts telling me what an idiot I was, save your breath. I already know. That doesn't make it any less funny.

The interesting part is that I knew the heart attack was coming long before it actually happened. I knew something was wrong, and I had a pretty good idea what it was. Now, any reasonably intelligent person would have gone to the hospital immediately. Instead, I decided to send my wife, Deniz, to Disney so I could have my heart attack in peace. Yes, you read that correctly. I actually arranged for my wife to be away while I dealt with a potentially fatal cardiac event. I figured there was no sense in having her worried and hovering over me while I was trying to get something done. Besides, I had everything under control. Or so I thought. As it turned out, my heart had a somewhat different opinion of the situation.

I waited. And waited. And probably waited quite a bit longer than I should have. Then one day, the pain hit like somebody had fired an arrow straight through my chest. Not a little discomfort, not indigestion, not one of those things where you wonder whether you should take an antacid. This was the real thing. So naturally, I got into my car and drove myself to the emergency room. Another brilliant decision, I know. I was lucky I didn't get stuck in traffic, because by the time I arrived, I could barely make it into the building. Two people had to help me inside. I finally got to the nurse and told her, quite calmly, that I was having a heart attack and that the lower left side was clogged. She looked at me like I was a complete idiot. I suppose they get a lot of people who diagnose themselves, and most of them are probably wrong. Unfortunately for her, I wasn't.

They started running tests, and suddenly things got interesting. My heart was apparently doing everything except what it was supposed to do. The doctor came out, looked at the results, and told me I was about to die. I looked at him and said, "No." That's it. Just no. I wasn't interested in dying, and as far as I was concerned, the matter wasn't open for discussion. Apparently, the doctor didn't find my response particularly reassuring, because the next thing I knew, they were rushing me into the cardiac catheterization lab.

Now, this is where most people would probably start getting frightened. After all, somebody is about to run a wire through your blood vessels and into your heart, and there is a rather significant possibility that things might not go according to plan. They offered me a sedative. I refused. Why on earth would I want to sleep through something this interesting? I wanted to watch! I've always been fascinated by how things work, and here was an opportunity to watch somebody repair my own heart from the inside. You don't get a front-row seat to that sort of thing every day. At least, I sincerely hope you don't.

So there I was, wide awake, watching them feed this wire through my arm toward my heart, and suddenly I started laughing. Not a nervous little chuckle, either. I was genuinely laughing because something they were doing was tickling me under my arm. The doctor looked at me like he'd never encountered anything quite like this before. The nurses were staring. Here they were, dealing with a man who had just been told he was about to die, and the idiot on the table was laughing because the procedure tickled. I don't know what they teach in medical school about dealing with patients like me, but judging by their expressions, apparently not much.

Then we got to the stents. The doctor was working on the blockage, and I was watching everything with considerable interest. I noticed the location and the bend, and I suggested that perhaps two stents would be a better idea. The doctor looked at me, considered it, and agreed. Good idea, he said. Then he wanted to know how I knew so much about what was going on. What can I say? I'm curious. I pay attention. I like understanding things. And if somebody is going to install hardware in my chest, I figure I ought to have at least some idea what they're doing. Eventually, he turned the screens toward me so I could get a better look.

And there it was. A 100% blockage. Completely closed. I pointed at the screen and said something along the lines of, "Look at that! I should be dead!" And I probably would have been if I'd gotten stuck in traffic on the way to the hospital. There's a comforting thought. Your entire future potentially determined by whether some idiot decides to stop in the middle of the road to make a left turn. Sometimes life really does come down to the smallest things.

Then the doctor opened the blockage.

I cannot adequately describe what that felt like. One moment, my heart was struggling, and the next, I could actually feel the difference as blood flow was restored. It was immediate. It was extraordinary. And naturally, being the mature, dignified, responsible adult that I am, I stood up, thrust my hand toward the ceiling, and yelled at the top of my lungs:

**"I AM HE-MAN!"**

Yes. Seriously.

There I was, in the middle of a cardiac procedure, with the wire still in my arm, announcing my transformation into a cartoon superhero. The medical staff had already dealt with my laughing, my refusal of sedation, and my helpful suggestions about stent placement. Apparently, they were now expected to deal with He-Man as well. I was absolutely delighted. I felt fantastic. The difference was so dramatic that I couldn't help myself. To me, it was one of the most amazing experiences I'd ever had. I had just watched somebody open up a completely blocked artery, and I could feel the result. How could anybody not get excited about that?

Eventually, I settled down long enough for them to finish the procedure and take the wire out. And because I'm me, I asked if I could keep it. The doctor agreed. So yes, I still have the wire. I also have a few stents in a bottle. Some people collect coins. Some collect stamps. Apparently, I collect cardiovascular hardware. I suppose everybody needs a hobby.

But the adventure wasn't finished yet.

They had placed one of those plastic compression devices on my wrist to keep the artery from bleeding after the procedure. Everything was going along nicely until the thing broke. Suddenly, blood started shooting out of my wrist. Now, most normal people would have panicked, screamed for help, or at least expressed some reasonable concern about the fact that their own blood was spraying into the air.

Not me.

I was still so ridiculously happy to be alive, and the whole situation struck me as so completely absurd, that I started pretending to be Spider-Man. There I was, pointing my wrist and making the web-shooting motions, except instead of imaginary spiderwebs, I had actual blood. And to complete the performance, I started singing the Spider-Man theme song.

Imagine being one of those nurses.

You've just helped save a man's life. He's laughed through part of the procedure, argued against being sedated, made suggestions about the stents, stood up and declared himself He-Man, and now he's shooting blood out of his wrist while singing about Spider-Man.

At some point, somebody probably should have checked whether I'd escaped from another department.

The staff weren't nearly as entertained as I was. They got my arm down, dealt with the bleeding, and replaced the device. My superhero career came to an abrupt end. Apparently, hospitals have rules against patients spraying blood around the room, even when they're providing their own musical accompaniment. No sense of humor, some people.

The next day, the doctor called me. He told me I was famous now.

I can only imagine the conversations in that hospital. "Remember the guy with the complete blockage?" "The one who refused sedation?" "No, the one who yelled that he was He-Man." "Oh! Spider-Man!" Yes, that one. I suspect they'll remember me for a while. I certainly remember them. They saved my life, and they allowed me to watch something that I found absolutely fascinating. I'm tremendously grateful for that, even if I demonstrated my gratitude in a somewhat unconventional manner.

Now, I need to say something before anybody gets the bright idea to follow my example. Don't. Seriously. I was extraordinarily lucky. Waiting for a heart attack to get worse, sending your wife away so you can deal with it privately, and driving yourself to the emergency room while your heart is in serious trouble are all terrible ideas. If you think you're having a heart attack, call 911. Don't try to recreate my adventure. The fact that I survived my own stupidity doesn't magically transform it into good judgment.

But I think the story illustrates something about the way I've always looked at life. Terrible things happen. Sometimes they're frightening, sometimes they're painful, and sometimes you have absolutely no control over them. I can't always control what happens to me, but I can often control how I react. And if I can find something ridiculous in the middle of a disaster, I'm probably going to laugh. Not because the situation isn't serious. Not because I don't understand the danger. But because I've never believed that being miserable makes a bad situation any better.

And now, after fifty years of smoking, I've decided to quit cigarettes. My brain is throwing a fit, I can't sleep, and every cup of coffee apparently comes with an invisible cigarette that my hand keeps trying to find. I'm fighting cravings practically nonstop, and somehow I'm still laughing about it.

After all, I've already been He-Man and Spider-Man.

**Surely I can survive being a nonsmoker.**

Although if I start climbing walls or shooting nicotine gum out of my wrists, somebody should probably call my doctor.

Because apparently even a heart attack can't make me behave myself.