I’m certainly glad I ran Sunday morning, because there is no way on earth that I will be able to bestir myself out of bed and onto the streets to run a mile tomorrow morning. In fact (checking) I haven’t even walked a half mile in the last forty-eight hours, when the flu hit me.
I do mean ‘hit’. At about five o’clock Sunday I made a joke on Facebook about my achey shoulders and my weariness, and within a few minutes I felt as though I had insulted The Incredible Hulk’s mother. (With him there, obviously.) I think I went to bed about about 8:30, woke at 3:15 and went downstairs to avoid disrupting Margaret’s sleep, tossed and turned till Margaret was up and away to her class, then napped intermittently for the rest of the day. Last night I spent the whole night downstairs for Margaret’s sake, and have been stationed here on the couch in the lounge or upstairs in bed the whole time.
I must confess: Over the past few years, I have sometimes noticed a friend’s observations about being bed-ridden, and I have thought, ‘Man, I could use a few days of mandatory bed rest. Get some reading done, maybe watch a film, catch up on much-needed rest.’
I don’t get the flu or colds as often as some other folks; I had entirely forgotten that, when you have the flu and are obligated to stay in bed, it’s because you don’t have enough energy even to… watch en episode of Castle*, much less an interesting film. I don’t have enough appetite to enjoy a casual treat. I can’t sleep steadily enough to get better rested. I can’t read more than a few sentences at a time.
In the second day of this flu, I’ve felt mostly seriously chilled (one hot spell at midday), achey and tired, some congestion, tossing and turning, aching ribs from coughing, and generally as miserable as they say that people with the flu feel. It’s not a relaxing vacation.
I apologise to all whose infirmities I have carelessly discounted. I yearn for the energy and stability to step back into something more like everyday life.
* I say Castle because I have to admit that I have been watching Seinfeld.