Jeaux-Jeaux

It was only a few years ago, that I was just like you. I had a job, a boyfriend, a little apartment...

My momma is from New Orleans and named me for her dead daddy – Joe. But being a girl and all, she changed my spellin' to “J-e-a-u-x.”

Much to my grandparents' dislike, she married my daddy, a white man from the bayou.

I have my momma's brown eyes and wide lips, but inherited my daddy's soft curls and pointy nose.

Growing up, the kids called me any variations of “oreo” they could come up with. I was quiet and did my best to go unnoticed.

Problem is, I happen to be particularly attractive – so I'm told – and going unnoticed has seldom worked.

So, I was used to getting a lot – of what I thought was unwarranted – attention, but I did my best to be non-deserving of it. I was a good girl. I went to school, went to work, went home. Never missed curfew. Took no vacations during Spring Break...never reckless.

Then it all changed.

Fresh out of college, my friends and I decided to take a cruise to celebrate our graduation. I've always been a little afraid of real deep water, but somehow they got me out there.

And what happens?

A freakin' squall – that's what!

And a tidal wave!

And one too many bangs in the head for Jeaux-Jeaux that's what.

So, obviously, we managed to get out of there alive...thank God...but something wasn't quite right.

The doctors thought, at first, it was just remnants of the concussion I'd suffered.

Then, they feared I was having symptoms of Tourette's Syndrome.

You see...I'd have these glitches – well, I liked to call them glitches (my mother says episodes) – where I just couldn't control what came out of my mouth.

Then, one night at one of my parents' parties, something even more unusual happened. One second, I'm talking to an old friend of the families' – I mean he's not quite “like an uncle” to me, but close enough, right? – anyways...

He says something about his last girlfriend (the man's an eternal bachelor) and how she had dumped him because he still kissed his momma on the lips.

So, naturally, I get one of those random “I wonder what it would be like to kiss him” thoughts running through my head. And before I know what's happening, or could attempt to stop myself, I was kissing him!

Again, naturally, my parents took me for more testing. If Tourette's was going to cause me to start randomly making out with their friends and acquaintances, I'd “have to be medicated.”

So they ran a few more scans of my cat and did a few more tests. Turns out, I don't have Tourette's.

I listened to their bla bla bla of doctor mumbo-jumbo before finally asking, “And the punch-line boys?”

“You've suffered a compilation of brain injuries resulting in the complete loss of your capacity to resist impulse. Your brain's ability to weigh and rationalize your wants and needs over consequence have been severely damaged it seems...”

I stopped listening somewhere around there, I'll be honest.

There would be no medications.

And as long as I could manage to live and maintain some semblance of a normal life, I needn't be hospitalized.

So, I went from a scared little Oreo hiding in the cookie jar to Impulse Girl.

Pretty quickly, my ability to control my impulses dwindled away. For awhile I managed to get by - writing off my odd outbursts or tendency to wander off as some new free-spirit hippie life-style I was pursuing.

It can be tricky.

I lost my boyfriend pretty quick.

He couldn't quite jive with my sudden change of character. Go figure right? I mean, it wasn't like I had hit-on, kissed, or cussed all his friends...yet.

Then, things really changed. Funny where a day, with nothing to do,can lead you.

It all really got interesting when I lost my job. But I'll save that story for next time.