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<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <meta name="Author" content="Tom Mandel"> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="Mozilla/4.61 (Macintosh; I; PPC) [Netscape]"> <meta name="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <title>bs.html</title> </head> <body text="#000000" bgcolor="#63C0B4" link="#0000FF" vlink="#551A8B" alink="#0000FF"> <h1> BRAIN SURGERY REVEALED <hr WIDTH="100%"></h1> <h1> <b><font size=+3><u>BRAIN SURGERY REVEALED</u> </font></b></h1> <font size=-1>from "Famous A**holes I Have Known" ©Tommy Mandel 1999</font> <hr WIDTH="100%"> <p> Here's what Brain Surgery is like: . Nothing. You're not there <br>while they're drilling the little hole in the side of your head, then <br>inserting the saw and opening up the top of your head like a toy coconut, <br>your skull clamped tighter than Tim Allen ever clamped a board in Home <br>Improvement. The actual microsurgery is done under a microscope (duh), <br>due to the nearly infinitessimal size of the vessels being worked on. <br>I was lucky. Oh was I lucky. Let's take a second to thank the Lord that <br>these fingers are even capable of receiving the kind of detailed messages <br>from the brain required to spit words of wild and wacky wisdom onto this <br>page. Thank you, Lord. When I exited from surgery, and had a smidgeon of <br>consciousness, I remember the first thing I did was wiggle my fingers to <br>see if I was gonna have to get a real job after recovering, or if music still <br>would flow from them. They worked. Thank you Lord. In order not to <br>(further) alienate the athiests agnostics and communists in our reading <br>audience, as few or many as there may be, I'll make that the last prayer in <br>this chapter. Thank goodness those fingers still worked. Thank goodness <br>ANYTHING still worked. It's good that I wasn't "there" when Dr. Ratcheson, <br>Dr. Mapstone and Dr. Tucker, of the Cleveland University Hospital <br>Neurosurgery team were dissecting and reconnecting me. I woulda puked. <br>Here's how it all began. <br> Ian's band was 5 men this year, the 3rd of my stint. Ronson was <br>gone. It was a lower budget tour, but there was more for me to do, new <br>synths and freedom, and it was fun. But since it was low Budg, the band <br>and crew were on the same travelling schedule, resulting in significantly <br>less sleep for us. Things began to blur around Michigan; I remember some <br>girl in my room, but that might have been Mark Kaufman, the size 13 shod <br>drummer who roomed with me that tour. He's a pilot now; first came to <br>NYC and drove a cab, drumming when he could and worked his way up the <br>ladder the old fashioned way. He had a good feel, was funny and good <br>looking, but was a little too smart at times. Once, he fucked the boss's <br>daughter and it cost him a decent gig. As his rommie, I can attest to the <br>love that boy had for rhythmic activities other than (musical) drumming. <br> So back to the operating table. Anyway, it was Yom Kippur, and we <br>found ourselves in Cleveland. Sam Lederman, Ian's Manager didn't book us <br>for Yom K, being of the Sandy Koufax school of Judaism. Sandy Koufax, for <br>those of you too young to recall, was the best pitcher in baseball in the <br>60's, a Brooklyn-born Dodger, who, at the peak of his powers, refused to <br>pitch in the World Series on the day of Yom Kippur. We Jews are <br>commanded to do no servile work on that day, it's the Sabbath of Sabbaths. <br>So, if it was good enough for Sandy Koufax, it was good enough reason for <br>Sam and I. (I once turned Bryan and his manager down on a gig in Argentina <br>because it fell on Yom Kippur. An incredulous Adams put his manager on <br>the phone to hear for himself, because he knew he would think Adams was <br>joking if he told him that someone would turn down 4 figures for a <br>religious holiday. Bruce Allen is a deeply religious man himself. His <br>religion, as best as I can see, is Winning.) <br> So I went to the Cleveland University Hillel Society (College Jewish <br>Organization) services, fasted and prayed up a storm, made peace with my <br>Maker for the year to come, and then took the bus back to the hotel, and <br>got ready for the evening's gig, at the Richfield Colliseum. Ian's song <br>"Cleveland Rocks ", from Schizophrenic, had intensified his acclaim around <br>that city, already a hotbed of hard rock enthusiasm. I had a cheese and <br>tomato sandwich, a few peanut m'n'm's and it was SHOW TIME! <br> There's one part of the set, where Ian himself plays piano (he's a GREAT <br>rhythm piano player, beats the low keys with his entire left palm on beats <br>2 and 4 to imitate the snare drum backbeat that he feels, amidst his <br>swingin 8's. . .) "It Was JUST ANOTHER NIGHT ! On the "Other Side" of Life" <br>sang Ian. Since my piano seat was occupied by a Bitchin British Bum, I was <br>told to go over to the mike on stage left where Robbie Alter, Ian's new <br>guitar sidekick normally played and sang, and "make some noise." Robbie <br>went center stage, to Ian's normal position, and I turned into maraca <br>monkey man, trying, without shame, to make as much of a dancin fool of <br>myself as was humanly possible. <br> This night, perhaps my energy was flagging a bit due to low sleep, & <br>lower food and liquid intake over the past 24 hours of fasting; so I slipped <br>back to the drum riser, and stole a sip of the bass player's Pepsi for a <br>little spark of energy mid song. Little spark indeed. Back at the mike, I did <br>my falsetto "Ooooo" on A above middle C. The next thing I knew, the world <br>had faded to a pinpoint of light, like the old TV sets used to do when you <br>turned them off. Then it was back to normal again, I was shakin the <br>maracas at the mike and then it happened again. I was not fully conscious <br>of what was happening, it was more like I came back from somewhere and <br>realized that for a moment, I had been nowhere. The third time it <br>happened, I was on my back looking up at Berrick Wickens, our drum roadie. <br>They all thought that I had just been clowning around on my back. Me, I <br>don't even recall falling down. But I had the definite feeling that <br>something was very wrong. So they took me off to the back stage right <br>area, gave me water, oxygen, and I waited for things to right themselves. <br>But they didn't. <br> I had to start the next song, "All The Way To Memphis " on the piano <br>with powerful staccato 8th note seventh chords, and my cue was Ian <br>throwing a cup of water in the air. When the cup hit the ground, that was <br>my sign to start playing. So the progress of the show hinged on my <br>execution of this simple act, but I was way out of it. Conditioned beast <br>that I was, I managed to throw what seemed to be my hand at what seemed <br>to be a keyboard at the proper moment. What I played was anybody's guess, <br>but the important thing was that sound was produced, and the band could <br>chime in. They had rolled me out on a road case. I guess I flailed through <br>the end of the set, and back in the dressing room, this beautiful big fan <br>who was apparently a nurse cradled me. I puked my guts out. Whoever and <br>wherever you are, Big Nurse, I thank you and miss you! Hope I didn't get any <br>on you, but, hey, you're a nurse, you're probably used to that. <br> Mayfair Hospital in Cleveland wouldn't admit me, because they heard <br>the word "Rock Concert", and assumed that I was a druggie who had fallen <br>down and hit his head. They persisted in billing me for months for ER <br>services, even called in a collection agency, until I irately threatened to sue <br>them for the way they had mishandled my case. <br> There were two or three more big gigs, Cobo Hall in Detroit, another <br>city that loved Ian, and a big Chicago one as well, so I just tried to <br>maintain for a few daze. All I wanted to do was lie horizontal in as dark <br>and quiet a place as possible for as long as possible. There was a terrible <br>throbbing in my head with each pulsebeat, and I suppose I was <br>unconsciously striving to reduce the number of bombshells bursting by <br>reducing my pulse rate. Survival mechanix. Don't remember much else of <br>that period. My girlfriend was having dreams that something was wrong <br>with me, and Jon Rosbrook the tour manager, could see it as well. So after <br>the last big gig, before a twentysomething hour drive down to Thibadeaux, <br>Louisianna, Marty Mooney from the record company, fortunately located in <br>the Cleveland area, and Jean, my girlfriend/manager and a 2nd year <br>graduate student in Psychology, experienced in all forms of mental <br>abberation, showed up to see how we could get me looked at. <br> To make a long story short, Dr. Howard Tucker, this Talmudic <br>Neurologist, guru, music lover and, in my case, lifesaver, did a spinal tap, <br>which was not painful, contrary to the cliche. (at least not compaired to <br>the pain I was in at the time.) He found 5cc's of blood in my spinal fluid, a <br>small amount, but enough to tip him off that there had been a bleed in my <br>brain. CAT scan. Aha! A small leak in a bubble like growth off of a small <br>artery in my skull...Aneurysm of the Post Communicative Artery, for all <br>you BrainSurgeons out there. <br> So now my mom's there, my twin sister, Mady is there, Jean's there, the <br>record co's there, and something's gonna get fixed. Enter Dr. Robert Ratcheson, <br>head of the Neurosurgery Department at Cleveland University Hospital. Not an <br>old guy, seems to know what he's doing. But alas, he's gotta go to LA the next day <br>to deliver a lecture and he'll leave the operation to his assistants, the <br>very capable Drs. HackitUp and SewItback. WAIT A MINUTE! My mom goes <br>into action. First, she force feeds me piano for 10 years, making me feel <br>like a bit of an outcast, but setting up my glorious career. Then, she walks <br>Dr. Ratcheson out of the room. Minutes later, he's back, and guess what? <br>HE'LL DO THE OPERATION! For years my mom wouldn't tell me what she <br>said. Finally, I found out. <br> "I just asked him to imagine it was his kid," she told me. Thanks, <br>ma, good work. <br> The first time I saw my face after the operation, I thought they had <br>made a mistake and put both of my eyes on the same side of my nose! The <br>swelling was intense. Nuprin and steroids helped to ease the pain, which <br>was already considerably less than before the operation. One day, Jean <br>sneaked me down in a wheelchair, through the bowels of the hospital to a <br>little chapel where there was a piano. The first time I tried to play, it <br>felt like my fingers were travelling through molasses. But it was ok. And <br>improved quickly. When the dox found out we had done that they were NOT <br>pleased. "Blow your nose and you may blow your brains out," was one <br>phrase that I remember being told before the operation. The other, more <br>pleasant memory was of Seconal, that great equalizer, administered to me <br>before my trip to the scalpel palace. Boy I felt great. <br> So the deal was, if I wanted piano priviledges, at the proper <br>time I had to go and visit a few patients who were Ian Hunter fans, and <br>were awaiting surgery. I was wheeled into a colorful children's ward, and <br>met a girl who's skull had been drilled and clamped into place to avoid any <br>motion that might destroy her spinal chord. I guess I made her day. But if I <br>didn't feel lucky before that, I sure did then. <br> On Halloween, I went home with Jean. And believe me, I didn't need a <br>mask that year! <br> Sometimes I think that I was saved then because there was more for <br>me to do in life. My daughters may have been the reason. Ian thinks that <br>I'm just a gritty survivor. But at the time, I was ready to go, if that was <br>what was meant to be.I knew who would get my clavinet, my B-3. No kids, <br>no fears. Maybe Jean, Mady, and my mom kept me alive. They sure were pulling. <p> Speaking of Mady, she's my twin sister, I'm almost an hour older. But she's been <br>ahead of me all through life: she was the first to realize that cassettes were <br>gonna be the new medium; me, I was like, "Yuck on that little puny tape? it <br>sounds terrible- reel to reel forever!" It was Mady's love of The West Side Story, <br>and her incessant playing of a broader range of music in her room that tempered <br>my AM radio Hitsville mentality with a wider influence. And curiously, the only <br>classical pieces that I remember from our childhood lessons, are the ones SHE <br>played, and I must have learned by ear, hearing her practicing them whilst I did <br>my homework or built model rockets. <br> <hr WIDTH="100%"> <a href="http://www.tommymandel.com/famous.html/table.html">table of contents</a> <br> <a href="http://www.tommymandel.com/index.html">tommy home</a> <br> </body> </html>