Mercury fillings takes over you, little by little. Mad hatter disease. Suddenly, it's here, without warning.

Enter Mad-Hatter disease.

The hallucination becomes real. It's frightening. It's skewed logic.

It's 1999 and strange things are happening. To the Sears card, the IRS, and poor ex-husband Dur and the "faggot" incident, something is brewing. But what? 

I was a reporter for The Daily Courier and the Trib in a former life, before the stroke. Five editorial members trekked upstairs to solve the problems...local editoral pieces; school board, low water pressure and ever-present sewage.

I'm making conversation about a gay guy in Mt. Pleasant, a "faggot".

"What a faggot," I exclaimed. Who said that? Me?

 A faggot? It's an pejorative. Where did it come from? In my brain? How in God's name? I like gay guys; they're neat, intellectual and empathic. ("Not that there is anything wrong with that...",I love Seinfeld)  I'm a right-wing liberal; a tree-hugging, save the owls and my philosophy is let and let live. My cohorts are amazed and rolling their eyes. I'm throughly confused. My brain is confused. It's the mercury fillings?

It's a late-spring evening and the tomatoes, zucchini and the peppers are doing quite well. The picnic table's octagon and Dur and I are conversing. The ladybugs, crickets and even the mosquitoes seemed to say it's spring. All of sudden, I blew up. (See? No rhyme or reason.)

I proceeded to tell Dur your daughter and husband were infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan; yes, big hoods, crossings ablaze and chic, polyester, robes. Indeed, I was whacked. Paranoid thoughts? He was dumbfounded. They never heard of KKK, last he heard. Durene was a legal secretary and Bob works in the auto industry, both from Michigan. Nice, nice people. It's the mercury fillings.

The bank called with a courtesy call. I'm underfunded. I wrote a check for Sears to the tune of $250. Somehow, I transposed the two-fifty for Sears for $60 dollars. Sad, but true. I called Dad immediately, explained the situation and Dad loaned the money to the bank. Good ol' Dad. How did I miss that?

The same as the Internal Revenue Service. I transposed the numbers for a $100 dollars, to $200 at tax time. The IRS called me. The IRS, by the way, couldn't be nicer. How did I miss that?

I fixed the checkbook.

Dur was gone June 1999. He fixed a tumbler Chivas Regal, packed his guns (Dur was a hunter) and off he went to wilds of Michigan. He fired up the Ram pick-up-truck and he never looked back. Wise man. Of course he died, clutching his chest, in 2007. 

Meanwhile, I had a catastrophic stroke, December 1999, and that's another story.

Thanks to the dentist in 2006, mercury fillings are gone. No Afib and no panic attacks.

The funky flashes of deja' vous, paranoid behavior and "someone's out to get me" are utterly gone. Again, I'm not a psychologist. I'm sane, (sort of). I'm 68 years old and I can breathe again with no remorse.

It's the mercury fillings...or not? You be the judge.