September 11th, 2008
Okay, I admit it, I’m sick. I knew for sure when I woke up this morning at 6:30 (as if that’s not annoying enough) and immediately felt like crap, most notably in the form of a sore throat. First I thought, “Oh, this must just be dry air, it will go away.” That was pretty funny, because there certainly was currently no dry air, either in my room or outside. Anyway, I drank some water, wondered why I wasn’t hungry and got back into bed with a super old copy of Cross Country Skier. This didn’t last long, though, as I fell back into a sickly slumber until about 9 am. When I woke up then with a worse sore throat, two earaches, a headache, feeling hot and cold, and still not hungry, I couldn’t deny it any longer. I told the friend I was supposed to bike with that I was sick, and I went back to sleep…again!
Sure, I probably should have seen it coming and done something about it. But this is a ton better than I would have done last year. Playing team sports my whole life, including college lacrosse, have worked my mental muscle memory into this immediate reaction when I’m sick, “So what, get up, get dressed, go to practice, work as hard as you can anyway, no excuses, do you want to win or not?” I’d say this was a big step I took, since I didn’t even have to repress those thoughts this morning. My immediate reaction was to cancel all my workouts and stay in bed. I finally pulled myself out of bed around 11:30 to shower, force myself to eat, and restock my fluids. Except for a brief stint on the couch, I spent much of the rest of the day pursing such activities as sleeping, reading, daydreaming and sleeping until around 2:30. At which point I had a little work to do in the office before cooking dinner for a group of 50 here. I was moving pretty slowly at first, but once I warmed up it actually felt good to be doing something!
About that daydreaming I did all day though…I spent some time reflecting on the beauty of my job this year. That is, I woke up sick and was able to s
