Acne

So, what caused these people to beat me up every day for three years? I looked different than most. First, I have not been able to gain any real weight since the 8th grade, thanks to a really high metabolism. I had double pneumonia, when I was younger, and I had a fever of 106 for 3 days. That should have killed me, but instead my body does not gain weight. People have said that I am special. I guess so. Also, I developed acne. It was bad. My parents sent me to a dermatologist who tried desperately to cure me. I got cordosone (spelling?) and other drugs. Ever had pernox? It is a soap with stuff like sand that scrubs out the pores. Kind of like Lava soap. The night that Martin Luther King was killed, we heard the news, while my father was scrubbing by face with pernox. Funny how things associate together like that. They took me to Duke University for those doctors to take a crack at me. No luck. They took pictures of me for a case study to train doctors in South Carolina on acne. Finally, my dermatologist put me in the hospital and performed a clinical dermabrasion. I think I was one of the first with that procedure. They had to put me to sleep. When I awoke, I had a giant facial scab. After about two weeks, the scab came off, and I had a few less layers of skin on my face. I can't really grow much of a beard anymore due to missing some hair pores. I have some facial scarring still, some of which is under my nose, so I have something of a moustache to cover those up. But, I looked different. And just like in nature, when an animal looks different and is cast off by its peers, I was cast off. No friends, until January 4th, 1970. But, there was a guy in my high school named Michael. He was very smart. He used to throw me across the room and lock me in lockers. Michael was in ROTC. He went on to college and killed himself his first semester in college. I went to his funeral. There was only one other person from our high school at his funeral. Michael killed himself, because he didn't have any friends. I realized then how lucky I was. Rest in peace, Michael.