Monday, March 9, 2015

Common Cold at the Levers

There are some times when the common cold stalks me for a while.  I get a sense that something is right behind me but after a good night of sleep or a cup of tea I look back and it is gone.  There are other times when the common cold doesn't spend any time messing around and just drives the front-end loader through my living room wall and lets the entire ton of bricks fall right on my head.

A couple of weeks ago, I felt like I was being stalked.  Every time I turned around I was being watched.  I felt a little more fatigued than usual or I had a little bit of a stuffy nose but the cold never quite caught up to me.  I thought it had given up because I didn't have the sense that it was there last week.  Until last night that is.

We invited a family over for dinner.  Now that my husband has finished nursing school we are trying to develop a social life again.  I made delicious meal and we had a nice evening of conversation.  Both kids were bathed and snuggled in bed asleep as I sat down to write.  That is when I heard the noise.  First it was the turn into the driveway and then the crash through the livingroom wall.  I sat there looking up at the load of bricks teetering above my head. I could see the common cold in the driver's seat.  Why can't you just follow me for another week I begged as I slipped away to make myself a cup of ginger-honey tea.  No was the emphatic answer as the cold worked the levers to drop the bricks.

The weight dropped on me as the bricks fell and then the cold backed out the hole in the wall to get another load to drop somewhere else no doubt.  I sat there in disbelief.  Didn't the cold know that I'm trying to finish our class novel, that we are in the midst of PARCC testing, that the baby is cutting molars.  Evidently that was not a care.  I crawled my way out from under the bricks to get a fresh box of kleenex and went to bed.

I woke up this morning bruised and battered.  I'm spacey, my throat hurts and I could crawl into bed and sleep all day.  Instead I'm going to put on my best face and do everything I can to heal hoping that the common cold won't make me feel as my mother always says "uncommonly bad".

3 comments:

  1. I like the brick and front-end loader metaphor! I particularly like how you described the cold crashing in on you - "First it was the turn into the driveway and then the crash through the livingroom wall. I sat there looking up at the load of bricks teetering above my head." Total surprise and painful for you, I am sure! Feel better soon!

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  2. Ugh, that front-end loader always appears at the WORST possible time! What a great way to describe the feeling...it's exactly like a load of bricks dumped on top of you. Feel better soon!

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  3. Great job - love the metaphor and can picture all of this as I sniffle and cough!

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