Covid Daze
Paul and I are starting out the new year with Covid. Somehow we managed to avoid any illness at all through the worst of the pandemic so we thought we were free and clear. We do still mask, mostly, in crowded places but I guess it was bound to find us as it slithers its serpentine way through the population.
I see this as an opportunity to purge the noxious toxins of the frenzied tantrum that was 2022; thus, making room for a more healed and healing energy going into 2023. I hear that this year is going to be one of intense self-reflection. Think of 2022 as the raging toddler who, in a fit of irrational pique, beans all her toys at the wall, stomps on the shattered pieces, surveys the carnage and thinks, perhaps only briefly, Oops, now what?
Does she just walk away and let someone else clean it up? Does she drop to her knees and wail with regret? Or, maybe she gathers her inner resources, acknowledges a lesson learned, and sets about putting the pieces back together, making them whole again, reminding herself in the process of those items that are precious to her and worth keeping?
Because Paul and I do everything together, we got sick at the same time. I can't think of a time when one of us has been this sick without the other. One might take comfort in the implied camaraderie of mutual ill-health but, I have to say, the coughing, the sneezing, the aches and pains, the tasteless food, the snot, and hot flashes, the inability to get a good night's sleep is making us rather miserable together. We find ourselves siloed off in separate rooms in a way that feels like back-turned isolation rather than an affable taking of one's own space.
Thankfully, the weather is mild so we can open some windows and get fresh country air into our lungs. The humidifier with Eucalyptus essential oil is pumping all the damn day and night. Tylenol is our friend. I know we will get better, in time, but it's the "in time" bit that might be the hardest to bear. You know how when you first get sick, your instinct is to ignore it because you have plans, you have cats to feed, places to go, people to meet? You are woman, you are strong. You aren't going to let a little thing like Covid stop you in your tracks?
But as the days wear on and the symptoms gather momentum, both in variety as well as intensity, you feel less and less like a warrior and more like a petulant child who is forced to concede that something more powerful than you is at the helm. You have no mind for reading, no headspace for conversation (your head is so full of phlegm that you can't hear anything anyway), reduced ability to focus on anything other than online shopping, TV watching, and cat petting, you gradually find yourself giving in to doing nothing.
That's Day One through Day Seven.
Day Eight: On a scale of 1 - 10, amorphous blob of bio-hazard being 1 and feeling fully human again being 10, I'd put myself somewhere around 5 -6 so that's a positive. Not going to run any marathons any time soon (okay, never, but you get my meaning) but I am getting out for a stroll of 5 - 10 minutes. And food is starting to have flavour again.
Day Nine: The dizzies have set in. Resorted to steroidal nose spray. This is hubris: yesterday I felt a bit more alive than usual so I overdid it - went for a short walk, worked at the computer, deigned to feel like I might be beating this thing. Covid, if nothing else, is good at showing me who's boss.
Day Ten (today!): Definitely on the mend.
Being both blessed and cursed with a curious self-reflective personality, I can't help but wonder what it all means. Why Covid? Why now? What did I gain by the forced slowing down? I'm pretty sure it has something to do with a clean slate, sloughing off the old of 2022 and starting fresh and renewed for 2023 but I can't quite articulate that concept as yet. It will have to come in time. For now, I'm just looking forward to getting back to my life, such as it is.
A warm welcome back to you all!
Let's Get Messy
Interested in writing with me in 2023? Check out my freewriting group experience coming to you in February.