I didn't sleep last night. The past few days have been messing with my head, and as soon as I find a thought to write down it seems to vanish.
I went with Bryon to the station today to see him off on his long trip to New Mexico. I'll be joining him in a week, to get a little fix for my desert jonesing, and ring in the New Year with him, the sagebrush, and the stars. I think it's a fitting way to start another orbit, and mark the beginning of my new life. New adventures, new things to learn. We are making plans, drawing up designs, plotting our escape together.
He left only four hours ago, and already I miss him terribly. I hung around the train station for a while afterwards, not quite sure how to deal with being sick, lonely, tired, stressed, and far from my bed. I watched the travelers coming and going, making echoes in the vaulted ceiling with their footsteps and the rattle of baggage, all destined for someplace, some bus or train or friendly person to take them home. I didn't really know where I ought to go. My home had just bought a bus ticket and gone away.
But this is not going to be about me wallowing in my solitude.
I've had the flu - THE flu, for the past five days. The one that wipes out a couple of specimens from the human population every year, that really nasty strain that thwarts all the vaccines and sends an unlucky few to the ER. The sort of thing you really ought to call by its full name, that bane of victorian medicine, the Influenza. My parents had it a couple of years ago, and my mother ended up in the hospital, and I came home to take care of them for a few days. My father said they were so ill they could barely get up to eat and take medicine and look after themselves. So they got horribly sick. I thought about this while I was curled up on the couch, half awake. I am no hypochondriac (most of the time) but generally I take most bouts of sickness in stride, drink some water, lay low, sleep. I have a killer immune system which makes most germs cower in fear, but oh, no. I ran a 100-102 degree fever for two days.My roommate thought I should be brought to the hospital. I couldn't move. Mostly I don't remember anything, except Bryon looking worried and tender, bringing me water and leaning over me to touch my forehead. I like to believe he somehow cured me, like he promised he would.
At any rate, it so happens that the next day following that - Saturday- I was still doing pretty poorly, but I had promised my friends I would cook them a festive dinner, and show my pal Marta how to roast a chicken. I wasn't sure I should even go....not that I didn't want to go, but that it might be crucial for me to stay in bed and rest. But I thought, y'know, a little holiday thing, maybe ten or twenty good friends, drinking tea and eating mashed potatoes, that would be okay. Then I could play head chef and direct a few people on how to make stuffing, all while taking it easy, possibly wrapped up cosy in a blanket with my boyfriend and some soup, recovering my strength.
Instead, we made food for at least thirty guests. While I was still barely on my feet. I probably looked like hell, with blue circles under my eyes and barely the gumption to stand and chop vegetables, but I roasted two chickens with rosemary (rumors of which, I might add, were reputedly better than many people's mothers' and grandmothers' version), mashed some potatoes with butter and cream, and gave a lesson in the fine art of homemade stuffing. What I did get to sample of it, I must say, was pretty damn excellent. I was cheered as I walked down the hallway. The good thing was that it made me believe I had real skill, and maybe I really could have my own restaurant someday. I would like that. The bad thing was that no one got the jist how badly off I actually was, so it was really hard to find a quiet place to eat and rest. So mostly I hid in Bryon's room until the coast was clear, because half of Jamaica Plain was hanging out in the hallway and kitchen. Psssht, loud drunken scenesters, stealing my dinner.
The best part was, they're all crunchy granola liberated art types, and I fed them evil tortured overfed hormone injected Perdue birds! bahahaha! Ooo, so evil.
At any rate, other than being a little sad, I am feeling much better now.
Recent Comments