tending to. . .

so, you say you have diarrhea. . . i get you. the gurgling sounds from your belly. . . the cramps. . . the anxiety each time you sneeze. . . the desire to fart but terror that it won’t just be a fart. yeah. . . i get it.

and sister, you say you have your period too. i’m there with you. in fact, i usually get diarrhea as a side symptom of my period. so you have those amazing cramps that send you scurrying to the toilet in a cold sweat expecting to explode the instant your cheeks hit the seat. . . only to discover that it was a menstrual cramp. . . and not the trots. and now, you’re just sitting there, waiting, wishing something would bring relief.

i get it.

but wait. . . you say you’ve got bronchitis. well, well, well. that adds another dimension. now you have uncontrollable coughing spasms. and each time you convulse into coughs you have to hope all other orifices lock down. you cross your legs and squeeze your butt cheeks with every cough that bears down on your stomach muscles.

that lands you clearly in the land of suck.

but wait, it’s friday and it’s chuseok (korean harvest festival) game day at school. so, first you will make sungpyeon (a tasty little rice cake treat) with your class. then you’ll move to another room to set up a game and every ten to fifteen minutes a group of 15 to 20 students bounce into your room where you, the carney, run a fun game for them. you’ll get to lunch about 20 minutes late because your games ran late and then your students need to change out of their traditional chuseok clothes before they eat. . . sometime, you’ll get the break you need to get to a doc to get the antibiotics you need for that nasty cough, and then it’s only another three hours of classes before you can go home.

that lands you clearly in the land of erika.

if the past two weeks had been different, it’s possibly i wouldn’t be feeling quite as craptastic. many nights out for dinner, and several late ones all in celebration of friends leaving. burned the candle from too many ends i suppose.

so, i have four days off. might have been nice to have planned some trip or occasion. . . but i need tending to, and my apartment needs tending to. last weekend i spent recovering from a late friday night and hoping i wouldn’t get this sick. but here i am. . . sick and resting. it would be nice to use a sick day every so often to aid in my health (instead of chewing through all my weekend time.) but for now, can’t complain of being bored. there’s plenty of cleaning, organizing, posting, reading, and tv watching to cover more than four days.

i am on lock down, for my own good.