recovering

I made it to the job test on Thursday night, only to find that I was one of about 250 people vying for the same job. I didn't let that daunt me too much...I did about as well on the test as I would have if there had been 5, 10, or 100 people in the room. Perhaps being sick hurt me a little, but probably not enough to really make a difference...my head was fairly clear. The administrator said that the results would be emailed in a day or two...I'm still waiting, and I don't have too much hope. I'm not really the kind of guy who beats 250 people. At my best, I'm the kind of guy who comes in somewhere in the top 10%...but never at #1. So it goes.

I wasn't feeling too great by the time the trip was over, though, so I finally broke down and went to the doctor on Friday. I guess the final diagnosis was Bronchitis, and I guess it's been a fairly common thing in this latest cold and flu season. My condition didn't raise much of an eyebrow, so I suppose I was never really at death's door. If I'd never sought treatment, it may have eventually developed into something worse...but the same can be said for a toothache or a dirty scratch, so we won't get too melodramatic.

The doctor gave me a 'breathing treatment'...sucking on a vaporizer for about twenty minutes or so. She gave me prescriptions: for steroids, antibiotics, an inhaler and cough syrup. I felt a lot better afterwards, but a little less better the next day and today. These things don't disappear overnight...I feel about as good as I felt on a few of the better days before I went to the clinic. The occasional coughing fit, and generally run-down (but at least not as horribly wiped-out as much of last week). I'm at the point where I can more or less reliably Do Stuff...hell, I may even try walking my dog tomorrow. Both of us have really missed that, I think.

Which is a fairly wry thought in my head: I got as sick as I'd been in a long, long time just after I'd actually begun to take measures towards improving my health. I'd sat on my ass for a good chunk of 2007, eating poorly, smoking more, et cetera...and once I gave up the ganja and started trotting my ass around in the fresh air, I came down with this nasty disease. It was if the Cosmos laughed at my feeble hubris, saying, "Oh, you think you're ever going to get a little healthier? Screw that- you're meant to live like an invalid."

I'm not going to let this hold me back too much...I'll give myself a few more days to get my strength back, and crawl up to my previous level of activity if I can.

I guess 2008 can only get better...but then again, surviving this sickness has been a pretty major thing for me. I suppose someone might say that making such a big deal out of it is just so much uncalled-for whining...but on the other hand, one might just as well say that paying so much attention to anything is an indication of a sort of celebration of life.

What a strange thought...there are in fact certain bad spells and disasters which I have privately enjoyed, or taken a certain amount of pride in having weathered. Not the bad times that I've caused via my mistakes and failings, nor the ones where others have suffered too much. For instance, I love remembering the flash flood of several years ago...once I'd made it home and verified that my wife and pets were safe, it was firmly installed in my mind as a Great Experience.

And I'm almost sorry, in a perverse sort of way, that I'm now on the road to recovery...because although being deathly ill was really no fun at all, it was a snow day for my psyche; I didn't have to worry about where I was going or how well I was doing in life, because all that mattered was getting to the point where I no longer physically suffered during every waking hour. It was nice just to have such a powerful distraction from the illness in my head.

Unfortunately, I'm now well enough to remember that I have very little to look forward to in the future, or to be proud of in my past. Things are getting Back to Normal...and it was only when I was sick that my relative health seemed like a good place to be.

Oh well, I'm no worse off. Well, except that last night I chipped off a corner of a tooth on the crusty bread that I was eating with my 75th can of chicken noodle soup. I had to smile. I was feeling better; it was time for my luck to pick up right where it left off when I first got sick. Time to go back to finding a job and worrying about money and the gradual decay of my body and wondering what the hell I was supposed to be looking forward to.