Roger Zee Memoirs
Health 1 11/18/20
Back in November of 2015, the March of Dimes (MOD) asked me to co-emcee the Rockers for Babies benefit at Pete's Saloon in Elmsford, NY. I gladly accepted and as I began preparing my welcoming remarks, it brought back a flood of memories about my own birth defects and health issues that I had long suppressed. Welcome to another excerpt from my memoirs, "Life And Times of a Pandemic Musician." B-|
As I enter my twilight years, I can honestly say I had my fun. But I had to fight through an awful lot of bad health to get it! My mom, Gloria, gave birth to me in Cheltenham, England in 1953. The US Air Force stationed her Captain husband, my dad, there during the Korean Conflict. Very pregnant, she followed him over from Brooklyn, NY. It turned out not a fun time for her. I came into the world a perpetually screaming, non-stop crying baby. No one could figure out why I couldn't hold down any food and fussed all the time. I think that started my mother's love-hate relationship with me. Eventually, they diagnosed me a celiac, an immune disease in which people can't eat gluten because it damages their small intestines. And then kept me away from wheat products.
When I turned six months old, the Korean Conflict ended and my family moved back to Brooklyn. At about four or five, doctors diagnosed me with severe scoliosis (curvature of the spine) and pigeon toes. Not surprising, since my paternal grandfather Meyer suffered from Spina Bifida and looked exactly like the Hunchback of Notre Dame! So they fitted me with metal Polio braces from waist to feet with a bar joining the special shoes I wore. At various intervals they adjusted the angle my feet pointed and I would kick and scream in agony for the next few days. I eventually booted right through my playpen floor and rails -- a harbinger of my Taekwondo career to come! :)
I grew up in the Fifties and Sixties when kids caught everything -- Chicken Pox, the Measles, the Mumps, and the German Measles. Had them all. Totally not fun! No vaccines then except for Small Pox and Polio. Thankfully, we vaccinated our two kids who never suffered through any of it. :)
At around eight, I developed severe allergies. I'd go to the doctor and they'd prick my back twenty times to find out what kept stuffing up my sinuses and making me sneeze. Once again, not helping my relationship with my Mom! Mucho medication ensued. But as would happen so many times in my life, for no reason at all, all of a sudden the problem just disappeared. Same as as with my celiac! Psychosomatic? :O
It didn't take long for additional medical disasters to occur. I developed a hernia and had to get operated on. My parents told me I caused it by tightening my belt too much! WTF? Then I got a sore throat so bad that I needed to get my tonsils removed. But back then, you got a two for one deal -- they threw in the adenoids as well! Unfortunately that caused me big-time problems. Wound up with a huge speech defect. To this day, I remember strutting into the hospital with my parents dressed in a cowboy hat and suit with my six guns strapped around my waist, my bow and arrow slung over my back, and machine gun caps firing away. Didn't take too long for the nurses to confiscate the weapons, LOL! I never noticed the speech problem but Great Neck North Junior and Senior High sure did. They made me take speech lessons for three years. Thank you Mr. Scopes! Such a nice man who mentored and tutored me through that period. And a great harmonica player as well! You can't imagine the amount of time I spent practicing my vowels and consonants in front of a mirror! ;)
And then I hit puberty and developed a severe case of acne -- a major "pizza face!" It destroyed my confidence just when I developed an interest in women and needed it most! My mom took me to see a famous dermatologist, Dr. Safir, in Manhattan who prescribed a ton of salves and creams and put me on a rigorous diet, almost like the diabetic regimen I follow today. No fried or greasy foods, no cookies, ice cream, cake, chocolate, no red sauce. In short, I couldn't eat anthing that a normal teenager craves. And to boot, it didn't work! :(
Then one day, a miracle occurred! My dad cut out two articles from a medical journal on acne research. In the first, doctors injected half the group of prisoners with chocolate and the other half with brown-colored water. Guess what? It made no difference! Both groups continued with the same amount of pimples! The other experiment put volunteers on a fried food and sweets diet and the other on a much less enjoyable regimen. Again, no difference. Epiphany -- it's all psychosomatic! I immediately went off my strict diet and ate like a teenager! And of course my acne started to disappear. Unfortunately, more trouble loomed on the horizon... ;)
So today, after consulting with my son Spencer's mother and my friends, it broke my heart to call him up and cancel our plans for him to spend Thanksgiving with me. I could barely choke out the words, explaining that if I catch Covid, there's only "One Way Out" for me -- death. For him to visit while he's still working, and ride the subway and Metro North to me, who knows what he'll carry. I just can't live with the thought of the guilt he'll live with if he gives me the Corona Virus and I pass. So I quote Bob Marley's song "Heathen" to him. "'Cause he who fight and run away, live to fight another day." By the time the vaccine comes around next year, I should stand high on the list to get it. Plenty of time to get together then.
So nine months into my Pandemic lockdown, I pick up a Mexican Fender Jazz bass, put on the Duane Allman Anthology double CD, and start working on the bass line to "Goin' Down Slow." "I had my fun if I never get well no more." One <3
YouTube - Goin' Down Slow -
Duane Allman
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