You know the scene in "Return of the Jedi" when Han Solo is released from carbonite? Princess Leia Organa, disguised as the bounty hunter Bossk, is there holding him, as he suffers the effects of illness caused by his captivity. Han asks who is she.

"Somebody who loves you," she replies.

Her soft voice reassured him -- once she took off her mask.

That's sort of how I felt earlier this month, when I made an untimely trip to the hospital. It's amazing how friends, family, even co-workers can reassure a person by showing a little bit of caring.

I had been playing a Sunday night pickup game of basketball in Maplewood, where I grew up. It was intense, and I was getting banged around underneath the basket as usual. But I was playing poorly, and I got mad at myself and pushed hard.

During the last game, though, I started to see stars. I got tunnel vision a bit. My neck hurt. I thought I would pass out.

So even though I had eaten, was well watered, and am in fairly good shape, I sat down and drank my third 36-ounce bottle of water of the day. I thought the problem was solved, and I stopped by my parents' house to get a couple things.

After the 10-minute drive, I was still feeling woozy and laid down to watch a movie. The TV -- only 3 feet away -- was blurry and so was my hand when I held it up in front of my face. Then, my left pinky finger went numb, and each subsequent finger on that hand followed. But I wasn't scared until I realized my hand wasn't asleep. It stopped feeling numb, and then my right pinky finger numbed and the subsequent fingers on that hand followed. I moved to another room to try to sleep and asked my parents to have my darling wife, who works in Maplewood, drive me home.

Then flu-like symptoms started.

My mom and my wife drove me to the hospital. I stayed for two days, undergoing several tests of the doctors' investigation, including a spinal tap, none of which came back positive. They determined I had overexerted myself playing basketball and concocted a migraine headache -- a sports migraine, they called it. A day later, I went back to another doctor for one more procedure that took care of some of the symptoms of the spinal tap.

I was out of work for a week. Then, I took some planned time off after my stay in the hospital.
And the day I left the hospital, I attended the Minnesota Timberwolves
loss to the Los Angeles Lakers -- bad decision, because I still had a
headache.

Lately, everything has been fine with me. My body is getting old, and I
have to learn to control it and -- especially -- not overexert myself.
Strange infliction to have, to be sure.

Sorry I haven't written about this sooner.

A lot of people called at St. John's Hospital in Maplewood and at home afterward. But in the closet of my hospital room, I forgotten my phone in my jacket pocket on silent ringer. I got all of the following messages to a sick kid -- me -- after I got out of hospital, and they really cheered me up.

My sister, Ali, called before she knew I was laid up:

"Hey, I just called to tell you to have a good last full week of work, um, and be excited for your break. I'm excited for your break, 'cause then I get to see you a couple times extra. And I'm excited for Christmas 'cause I get to see you extra. So I love you and I think you're wonderful. And yeah, all right, that's all. I hope you have a good day buddy. Bye."

Buddy John I. said:

"Mathias, this is John, uh, I heard you were all (messed) up. Uh, just calling ot see if you're OK. What the (heck) is going on? Um, if you can, give me a call, let me know what's going on. Hope everything is OK now. I'm in Tampa now, checked into my hotel now and everything. I'll talk to you later. Bye."

Buddy Tim said:

"Hey, Mat, I tried to call like five times today, but every time the phone was busy, so hope you're doing OK. I love you buddy. Um, I called John, let him know, so hopefully he called and got in contact with you. I also let Nikki and my mom call, so I don't know who all called you, but I hope somebody did. I know the hospital (stinks), especially if you haven't been there much. But, uh, I did hear Chuck called, so that was good to hear. Let me know about tomorrow. I know tomorrow's the big Wolves game, so I'm pumped for it. Just let me know what's going on. All right. Bye."

Buddy Tim again:

"Hey, Matty, just seeing if you're out of the hospital. Hope you're doing OK. Give me a call. I'll try you there. Bye."

Buddy Jess said:

"Hey, Matty, this is Jessica. Just calling to see how you're doing. Um, what's the matter with you? I hope you're starting to feel better, and I hope the doctors are figuring out what's the matter. Praying for you. Give me a call, let me know what's up. It's one o'clock on Tuesday and I'm headed to the hill for some snowboarding, but I'll be available you know with in the next half-hour. Give me a call. Hope you're doing OK. Bye."

Buddy Tim again:

"Hey Mathias. This is Tim. I'm just wondering about basketball tonight for the Wolves. Let me know if you can't go, but if you are, just need to know what time you want me to pick you up."

After I got home, Mom said:

"Hey, you called and I wasn't here. So I was having lunch with Byerly's group up at Kozlak's, so that was really fun. I hope everything is OK, so I hope you called dad or something. Anyway, you can call me. I'll be home in ... I don't know, I got to take Mary Kay home and then I'll be home. Bye."

Basketball teammate and family friend Josh:

"Oh hi, Mat, this is Josh. I just got your, got your message. So it's good to hear that you're doing better. I know that Penny had e-mailed me -- I don't know when that was -- Monday morning that you were in the hospital. So it's kind of a crazy deal. So it's good that you're doing better. So I was trying to think of if you got hit in the head, and I thought I remember you grabbing your neck, for some reason, I think I was sitting out or whatever. So I thought I remember you grabbing your neck, so I wonder if you got hit in the neck or hit in the head or anything. That's crazy. Luckily it wasn't anything, anything bad. So, so anyway, that's good news, I suppose. Um, but anyway, so, well, I'll probably just come on Sunday. I don't think we have anything going on, so I'll maybe just come and play on Sunday, and I'm going to play tomorrow, er, on Thursday at our church. So I'll be there, even though I've been stinking it up lately. I don't know what my problem is, but might as well keep playing. I don't know what's up. I kind of like playing with your group of friends, almost moreso than at our church, but ... But anyway ... So I don't know if you saw, but it looks like Detroit just traded ... gee, Florida just traded Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis for a bunch of it looks like minor leaguers -- Andrew Miller and some phenom guy. So hopefully the Twins trade, hopefully the Twins do something, or we're going to stink badly next year. But anyway, so anyway, we'll probably see you on Sunday."

John I. again:

"Hey Mathias. This is John. I got your message. Um, that's weird. That (stinks). Uh, I don't know, it'd be nice to talk to you in person at some point, but I understand you're recuperating so ... I s'pose it's about 8 o'clock your time, 9 in Florida here. I just got back to the hotel, so if you feel up to it, give me a call. I'll be back, uh, later on tomorrow night. I guess that's about it, I hope you're feeling better. Tim left me a message saying that you got out at 10:30 this afternoon, so I don't really know what that means, but that's Tim for ya. Um, give me a call. Talk to you soon."

Intern Candice said:

"Hi Mathias, it's Candice. Um, I just stopped into the office and, uh, Brandon said you still weren't feelng well, um, so I hope you feel better. Um, I just wanted to talk with you, sometime when you're up for it, about the end of the semester here. The last week of officials classes is this coming week. I just wanted to make sure we could wrap everything up and, uh, see what we all needed to finish and things like that. So you can give me a call whenever you feel up to it, whenever you get a chance. ... Hope you feel better. All right, bu-bye."

Grandpa Jerry said:

"Hi Mat, it's Grandpa calling. Just wondering how you're feeling this morning and if you what time you want us to come over this morning, if or when. And if you had talked to the doctor or whatever. Call us back as soon as you can so we can decide what were gonna do here. Thanks Mat. Bu-bye."

Sister Ali again:

"Hey buddy I just called to see how you're doing. Um, you can give me a call when you get a chance, if you want to. I'm guess maybe you're sleeping. I love you. Talk to you later."

Co-worker and buddy Brandon:

"Hey, it's Brandon, um, just calling. I don't want to bother you while you're recuperating, but you mentioned in your message to me that we should probably touch base about what we've got going this week. Um, just so you know I've got a choir concert on Monday that I'm going to ask Ron to shoot. I've got a school board meeting on Monday. I'm going to do a story about Radar retiring. And I've got a couple of essay contests and poster contests and student of the month type pictures for school section. Uh, but other than that, uh, working on the warm hearts story as well. If you wanted to call, I'll be here probably not all the way through till 3:30 today, maybe untill 2, um, but I'll be in all day tomorrow. So you can give me a call either this afternoon or tomorrow. That'd be cool. OK. Bye."

When I was at the hospital the second time, my darling wife said:

"Hey, Matty, it's me. Um, It's about 3:15. I thought you would probably be done by now. So just calling to see how it went. Um, give me a call. I'll talk to you later. Bye."