WORDS FROM W.W. August 27, 2016
Like dark clouds appearing over Pike’s Peak, I could feel it coming on yesterday! A head cold! I think I’d rather have a hemorrhoid than a head cold, but this isn’t “Let’s Make A Deal!”, and I didn’t get to choose between Door Number 1 and Door Number 2.
I hear the phrase quite often, “Fighting a cold!” There’s probably some legitimate remedies that we soldiers of life can follow for that to happen, but for me it seems to be more “surrendering to a cold.” I just give in…let it do its thing…and pick up the scattered tissues afterwards.
I was talking to Sara, one of my local Starbucks employees and mother of three, yesterday morning and she mentioned how two of her kids had been out of school this week with colds. Maybe she planted the seed in my head, but it seemed like I started feeling a little tightness in my throat at that moment. By the end of football practice that afternoon my throat had a slight dryness to it, but I was hoping that was just connected to the amount of “corrected instruction” I had to do during the practice. By the end of dinner last night there was no question what my problem was. I checked our supply of tissue boxes before I went to bed.
This morning I’m sitting at my spot in Starbucks and every once in a while it feels like a bug is crawling down out of my left nostril. Thank God, it isn’t! But it is a nasal discharge, or, in middle school student language, snot! My voice makes me sound like Marlon Brando in The Godfather.
My white flag has gone up! I’ve surrendered! In a couple of days this culprit will get tired of me and move on, leaving me to pick up the pieces. Sometimes we just have to give in and give up, and write a blog post about the experience. I’ll surrender to my bed for a time of rest this afternoon, read a book, whine a little bit to Carol who will say how sorry she is…and then she’ll resume watching the Cubs game on TV. I’ll get a cup of hot tea and drink it with my pinky extended. I’ll make sure we have some Nyquil for bedtime to supplement another cup of tea, this time Celestial Seasonings Sleepytime blend. Like the inevitability of Finals Week for a college student, I’ll just get through it!
Head colds are direct consequences for the many times we’ve been head cases. They remind us that we’re fallen creatures living in the midst of other fallen creatures. I guest taught a seventh grade health class this week. The subject matter was “Nasty Habits That Mess With our Health.” One of the nasty habits was not covering our mouth and nose when we sneeze. the alarming statistic was that “snot” comes out of our nose and mouth at a hundred miles an hour and travels ten feet. Watch out! If I’m around my grandson, who hasn’t mastered the habit of sneezing in the bend of his elbow, I can easily get sprayed. It’s like getting slimed in a Ghostbusters movie. I don’t get upset. It is what it is!
The level of tissues in my Kleenex box is going down rapidly. Where does all this fluid in my nostrils come from? Why do es my head feel like a beachball? Why does it feel like I have to urinate every fifteen minutes? Why? Why? Why?
Forget the questions! I’m just surrendering to the reality…and thinking fondly of hemorrhoids!
Words from WW Blog 