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very slowly, so in six months or so, we’ll do another MRI. Don’t worry. You’re going to be okay.”
    “What about my hearing?” I asked.
    “We don’t know what might be causing the hearing loss, but you should start a course of prednisone, the steroid, just to go with the odds. Your deafness might lessen if left alone, but we’ve had success with the steroids in bringing back hearing. There are side effects, like insomnia, weight gain, night sweats, and depression.”
    “Oh, boy,” I said. “Those side effects might make up most of my personality already. Will the ’roids also make me quick to pass judgment? And I’ve always wished I had a dozen more skin tags and moles.”
    The doctor chuckled. “You’re a funny man.”
    I wanted to throw my phone into a wall but I said good-bye instead and glared at the tumorless people and their pretty tumorless heads.
13. Meningioma
    Mayoclinic.com defines “meningioma” as “a tumor that arises from the meninges—the membranes that surround your brain and spinal cord. The majority of meningioma cases are noncancerous (benign), though rarely a meningioma can be cancerous (malignant).”
    Okay, that was a scary and yet strangely positive definition. No one ever wants to read the word “malignant” unless one is reading a Charles Dickens novel about an evil landlord, but “benign” and “majority” are two things that go great together.
    From the University of Washington Medical School Web site I learned that meningioma tumors “are usually benign, slow growing and do not spread into normal brain tissue. Typically, a meningioma grows inward, causing pressure on the brain or spinal cord. It may grow outward toward the skull, causing it to thicken.”
    So, wait, what the fuck? A meningioma can cause pressure on the brain and spinal fluid? Oh, you mean, just like fucking hydrocephalus? Just like the water demon that once tried to crush my brain and kill me? Armed with this new information—with these new questions—I called my doctor.
    “Hey, you’re okay,” he said. “We’re going to closely monitor you. And your meningioma is very small.”
    “Okay, but I just read—”
    “Did you go on the Internet?”
    “Yes.”
    “Which sites?”
    “Mayo Clinic and the University of Washington.”
    “Okay, so those are pretty good sites. Let me look at them.”
    I listened to my doctor type.
    “Okay, those are accurate,” he said.
    “What do you mean by accurate?” I asked. “I mean, the whole pressure on the brain thing, that sounds like hydrocephalus.”
    “Well, there were some irregularities in your MRI that were the burr holes from your surgery and there seems to be some scarring and perhaps you had an old concussion, but other than that, it all looks fine.”
    “But what about me going deaf? Can’t these tumors make you lose hearing?”
    “Yes, but only if they’re located near an auditory nerve. And your tumor is not.”
    “Can this tumor cause pressure on my brain?”
    “It could, but yours is too small for that.”
    “So, I’m supposed to trust you on the tumor thing when you can’t figure out the hearing thing?”
    “The MRI revealed the meningioma, but that’s just an image. There is no physical correlation between your deafness and the tumor. Do the twenty-day treatment of Prednisone and the audiologist and I will examine your ear, and your hearing. Then, if there’s no improvement, we’ll figure out other ways of treating you.”
    “But you won’t be treating the tumor?”
    “Like I said, we’ll scan you again in six to nine months—”
    “You said six before.”
    “Okay, in six months we’ll take another MRI, and if it has grown significantly—or has changed shape or location or anything dramatic—then we’ll talk about treatment options. But if you look on the Internet, and I know you’re going to spend a lot of time obsessing on this—as you should—I’ll tell you what you’ll find. About 5 percent of the