Shins

“Earth is so thick with divine possibility that it is a wonder we can walk anywhere without cracking our shins on altars.”
~ Barbara Brown Taylor, An Altar in the World

---

I’ve been sick and miserable for a week and a half.

Before we get started, let me just state that this is my first cold/flu/viral apocalypse of the 2024-2025 virus season. I have had a few stomach ills–as they, since e. coli, appear to be my new specialty–but all the seasonal bugs that have come a’knockin’ have been met by a stout wall of zinc and C and flatly refused admittance, thank you very much.

Until this one.

Also since the great e.coli attack of 2021, my immune system is even shot-ter than it has been for the first 45 years of my life. You get a bug, it looks like sniffles and a hack for a few days. I get it and I’m rendered immobile and disgusting for 2 or 3 weeks. Hence the recent intensity in the application of zinc, C, and dug-in heels at the first sign of illness.

I was feeling pretty good about my streak, as you might imagine. The ol’ Amazon order history may show an alarming and possibly addictive dependence on Zicam, but dammit, I did it! I made it through.

Oh, how the mighty fall.

N E V E R T H E L E S S

Even from behind the sockful of gravel and scalpels that has taken up permanent residence in my throat,

even lacking a night’s sleep in almost 2 weeks,

even among day after day of sitting and moaning and staring and attempting (futilely) through brute force to remove said sockful of scalpels through aggressive throat-clearing that worries the neighbors…

Even then, the altars are everywhere.

---

“Bidden or not bidden, God is present.”
~ Carl Jung

---

I think I’m almost through it. The last 24 hours has brought a lessening of the general feelings of death, if not much relief in the throat-al area. I’m able to do a few things. And think, which is not to be underestimated.

And I’ve been hit hard in the shins with gratitude for the gifts riding on the coattails of this particular bug.

A few…

Humility. A tough pill to swallow, but it is good sometimes to be knocked down just a peg or two. Tell too many people that you’ve found the key to health and happiness (ZINC!!!) and said key is bound to show its Kryptonite. As are you.

The changing of seasons. It’s wet and cold and sunny and stormy and windy and cloudy and hot and muddy and frosty and humid and lightning-y and clear all the way to the sun. Even a sick chick can soak up those rays.

Deafening choirs. I don’t know about where you live, but the birds and the frogs around here are in seeming ecstasy these days. Last night the hubs made some steaks out over the firepit and we sat around said fire for the evening. Upon hearing a bird we couldn’t recognize, I fired up the old Merlin app. Possibly what we were hearing was in there amongst the dozen voices it picked up on, but differentiating was impossible. It flashed around in it’s own state of ecstasy, and it was impossible to keep up. Those dozen didn’t even include at least 6 different friends we were watching work silently away at their nests and mates and evening bug-sucking. What a world.

Buds and blooms. Good Lord, go outside, find some trees, and look up. It’s a friggen’ carnival up there.

Validation. It’s good to know that there is indeed still a reason that I avoid y’all like the plague every time you’ve got one. This system’s still running a big sluggish. Best to stock up on another palette of Zicam. I think I need a gut-bug transplant. Someone told me after e. coli that the best thing I could do for myself would be to find the nearest farmer neighbor who still milks by hand and give him a big old sloppy kiss. I did not do that. Four years down the road it’s sounding like a better idea.

Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam… There’s just something about a man who will sleep like a baby, right there beside a woman who is hacking and ha-gheming and snorting and moaning and thrashing and lamenting. You know, rather than locking her in a dark room and sliding some dry bread crusts under the door once in a while. Also, a guy who will sit through seemingly endless episodes of Big Bang Theory with you, for they are the antidote to misery. Makes you grateful for what you’ve got.

Books. Thank God for books. Even when you’re too sick to read them, sometimes just the sight of That Stack can bring you hope. Also, when capable of such an arduous task as reading, I took the time to finish the book I’ve been dragging along for months. Detective sheep. I don’t even know. It took me so long I couldn’t even follow the whole plot. Nevertheless, feeling some bizarre compulsion to finish it, I DID. So I could get to my next Lief Enger. Amen.

Good and wonderful friends. They check in on you sometimes when they know you’re down. It’s nice.

Silence. Something about a throat that is in agony gives you a new appreciation for silence. Space to hear all those birds and frogs. Freedom to not fill the voids in conversation. And somehow, a strange awareness of your own noises and those of your quiet home. Not that I generally spend my solo days talking to myself or screeching along to music (although I may do both of those more often than is strictly needed), but when you’re actively suppressing your vocal chords, it’s a different silence. I found it full.

Serendipity. So a week in, I decided it was time to take myself in for a strep test, in the process parting with yet another $500 to line the pockets of the American healthcare system. As I returned to my van after the kiln-fresh swabbing, a certain fantastic and far-flung friend texted me that she had just walked out of her audiology appointment and learned that things are not pretty there in her ear canals. We had a little back and forth while I was on my way across town to the Walmart for the Zicam (running low is not an option), when it occurred to me that she was describing some landmarks that were too familiar to be coincidence. Turns out she was in the same little city as me. Not only that, when she texted me that first audiological horror, we were both sitting in the same hospital parking lot. Needless to say, we rendezvoused and sat at the local Culver’s for a few hours (across from one another at the biggest table we could find) while I waited for my strep results. This would always be a wonderful experience, but just to add to it, we were able to sign a good deal of our conversation, meeting some serious mutual goals and allowing my throbbing larynx to rest. Also, no strep.

Community. While AT the Culver’s, I ran into not one, but two of the no-longer-kiddos I watched grow up as a part of our homeschooling group. One only in passing, but we see each other on the regular; his mom and I kinda like to chat. The other, though, a young man I haven’t talked to in years; he had a niggling feeling he knew me, but I with the steely memory had his name. He’s married now and manages that particular Culver’s with a contagious vigor and joy, and we had a lovely, if painful, conversation while I ordered my steel wool and glass shard meal. Community grows and changes, but it never dies.

Learning. I wasn’t able to exercise. I wasn’t able to go for walks. Cooking was not something that was happening. Eating was barely something that was happening. Reading? Not much. Writing? Even less. What I COULD do while in the throes of throat-clearing, for whatever reason, was study my ASL. Man, I powered through some lessons. Good thing, too, or that impromptu Culver’s date would have been a lot more boring. Aside from this little illness-induced power up, how wild is it that we can still learn new stuff?

Solidarity. I, contrary to my own insistence, am not the only one in misery. My misery isn’t even that bad when lined up toe to toe with most others. When someone else you love is suffering, sitting with your own suffering with a little patience, or even acceptance, can take on the flavor of healing and love and solidarity. And even when you have the voice of a hissing cat and forming words feels like gargling swords, a long phone catch-up with someone else who is laid up can be delightful. Humorous and delightful.

---

“Because you are the whole damned sky.”
~Kate Bowler, The Lives We Actually Have