Fall and winter weather brings us indoors and corrals us like penned livestock at the county fair. This togetherness demands politeness which allows the flu to move from runny noses to hearty handshakes and the entire herd is soon infected-- sickened by good manners.
During flu season some years ago my family left to visit my wife’s folks and I and the Boxer were left behind to keep the home fires burning. A few days earlier I had politely shaken about three hundred hands after speaking at a seminar on public health and drinking water. Now I planned a weekend of pizza, war movies and more pizza. Instead I felt sick and achy.
By night I had fallen down the deep dark well of flu. I lay in bed drenched in sweat, my bed clothes damp and twisted around me. My joints were on fire and my head was a bass drum that beat with a vengeance. I would drag myself out of bed to get things like ginger ale, cold drinks, saltine crackers and more blankets. I lost track of time, my street address and the concept of America. I no longer cared about gas mileage or quick relief from hemorrhoids.
I was hot and someone hit me in the stomach with a baseball bat. I hurried to the toilet then returned to bed and collapsed on sheets that were now pulled off the corners of the mattress. I burrowed into blankets that had become infused with sickness. My mouth tasted like I had eaten bad gopher meat.
I dozed off, then awakened and was cold and there weren’t enough blankets so I put on my old blue bathrobe. Still cold, I saw my wife’s pink bathrobe and put that on –gender distinction was now a casualty. Then I became hot and I threw the robes and blankets off. My stomach would sink and then rise and I turned green.
I had short vivid snatches of dreams, sometimes chasing a yellow taxi that could not be caught. I made a mental note to be more sympathetic to dogs that chase cars. The flu was two days and a night that blended into an eternity.
Finally I awoke and felt a bit better. The house was dark, chilled and quiet. I got up and went downstairs to the kitchen. I turned on the light switch and the clock on the wall showed the time to be 5:00 a.m.
The kitchen looked like the 82nd Airborne had passed through it! Saltine crackers were scattered all over the counter, cabinet doors had been thrown wide open, balled up tissues were strewn about, a liter of ginger ale with the top off sat by the sink and red and white Tylenol capsules were scattered beside an empty water glass. An unbroken stream of paper towels ran from the towel rack on the counter down to a folded-over pile on the floor-- evidence of a quick pull that had gone terribly wrong.
My gaze settled lower. A bottom cabinet door had been left open. The Boxer had found a box of Pop-Tarts and her belly was swollen as she licked up what looked like her 37th Pop- Tart. From the looks of the floor she had eaten her way through a buffet of Cheerios, all-purpose flour, marshmallows, a blue sponge and pancake syrup. The fall of Rome was prettier than this.
I stared wide-eyed at the scene as the Boxer stopped for a moment and looked up at me with an expression that said, “What?” I snapped the lights back off!
This was the price of togetherness. I’ve never gotten over it.
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