Summer 2010, the 39th Summer
Summer of the Ill Winds
Summer of the Sick Bed
Summer of the Unfortunate Luck
Summer of the Fever Sweats
The Lost Summer
The Body Rebellion Summer
The Summer I Lost My Health and Regained My Appreciation for Breathing without Coughing
Well, I've been absent again, Dear Readers, without planning and with great frustration. Just after I finished my two weeks of drafting I came down with a head cold. No problem, I thought, it's the summer. I can rest and drink OJ and take over-the counter meds and it will be gone in 48 hours. Not so, not so. The head cold traversed my sinuses, then headed for the ears and throat and finally settled in my lungs. The coughing which will not let me sleep began a week ago. Four days ago, I "woke up," really just roused myself from my sick bed where I'd been able to doze off and on during the night, to discover, I'd developed the stinking pink eye. Yes, you can give yourself pink eye, no need to be exposed to another victim...just manufacture the illness yourself. So now, I'm officially diagnosed with bronchitis and conjunctivitas and am on the dreaded antibiotics I'd tried to avoid.
The worst of it is the frustration with my own body. I feel as if it has betrayed me this summer. First the back issues, now the upper respiratory stuff. I live a fairly healthy life...no smoking, very little drinking, lots of sleeping, and ok, maybe not enough exercise, but that was changing due my physical therapy for my back. As a good friend, who is suffering her own ill-fated summer, just said in an email: what angry god have I offended? (I paraphrase). Really, I feel like the weak secondary female character of a Victorian novel. You know the one, the one who succumbs to the fevers and the chills, who faints at the slightest upset and takes to her sick bed to be nursed by our heroine, the strong and undiscovered beauty whom the hero will eventually recognize as his soul mate, leaving the simpering, whimpering weakling to his lesser peer. (Pictured here is The Sick Woman, by Jan Steen. RIJKS MUSEUM, AMSTERDAM from a book on Flemish furniture. It's odd that the chairs are detailed there as well, but the picture sums up my past weeks so well I grabbed it.)
Needless to say, poetry has been sidelined for the time being. I haven't had more than a few hours of undisturbed sleep at any give time for the past week, so my brain is muddled at best. Yesterday, I was able to read a beach book and keep up with the plot so I'm hopeful that poetry will be back on my agenda in the next few days. Be patient, Dear Reader, and I will try to transform my sickness into health.
7 comments:
Dear Sandy,
I know this frustration very well myself. I'm pretty religious about health stuff and I still end up in the hospital on a regular basis. I also feel the sting of being one of those "Victorian" ladies on the sickbed.
The upside is at least it helps us appreciate our health while we have it, right? And also, I've written some pretty good poems while sick - in the recovery phase.
Best of wishes for a speedy recovery and robust good health!
Oh no! Do you need me to make you some Beef Tea
Supervillainess, thanks for the good wishes. I wrote one of my best poems from my first book when I had a fever of 101!
Tricia, sounds so enticing and I might just get better under the threat of Beef Tea! ;)
1. that far much more elegantly phrased than what I actually wrote (and more polite as well)
2. I know EXACTLY what you mean about the Victorian novel character. It occurred to me while lying abed that Austen would not have written disparagingly of my lingering illnesses and Dickens would have killed me off in the 3rd installment of the novel just to get me out of the way of the main characters' happy ending.
Oh, Anne, thanks for the Dickens smile!
This equating of ill health with weakness is flawed flawed flawed. I'm quite sure, Sandy, that you would've scoffed at wearing such a ridiculous and debilitating thing as a corset, and as such, would have survived hale and blooming to the end of any Victorian novel! I hope you recover soon!
Marie, thanks for the reality check. Yes illness does not equal weakness...I guess I was having a bit of a pity party for myself.
I am already feeling better and thank the gods and goddesses that we live in a corset free age!
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