I'm Sick

 Seriously you guys, I am SO SICK, and I have been stupidly engaging in presenteeism even though I am STRONGLY DISAPPROVING when other people do it. It's not because I think I owe anything to the school board (oh my goodness I do not). It's not because I have delusions of grandeur about how important my job is - wait, maybe I do, because at some of my schools my classes have already missed two weeks of library because of EQAO (which necessitated students writing exams in the library), and it's almost the end of the year, which means most of the librarians are closing the library to circulation soon if not now, and I really didn't want to make them miss one of the last library periods. 

Also, and I am putting myself out there so try to be kind, I have realized that there is a dumb little part of people-pleasing oldest-child self that always suspects that if I call in sick people think I'm faking, so it's a tiny bit gratifying to go in and have people say oh my GOD, you sound TERRIBLE, why are you even here. Except then, well, I'm there and I'm sick, so what the hell, I'm an idiot.

Anyway, I went to the doctor yesterday and even there they were like oh my GOD, you sound TERRIBLE, and stuck thermometers and pulse oximeters on me, and now I have antibiotics and inhalers up the wazoo.

Today I sent Angus a song that I can't stop listening to lately and said I couldn't decide if it was country. He said "look at you sending music" as if I was five, or eighty, little twerp. Then I said "on further reflection, I'm not entirely sure it's not about contemplating suicide, which is not the vibe I'm going for." We decided that buddy is probably not actually going to the water to throw himself in. 

Angus is driving to Virginia this weekend to see his friend Ben Adams play in the College World Series. Ben's parents were both teachers at the kids' high school, and they always called Ben Angus's Brother from Another Mother. In university some of the team saw him on Instagram and pretended they thought he was Angus's younger brother who he never talked about because he was jealous of how good he was at baseball. He's staying with the family in the hotel, so that should prompt a whole new round of confusion. When we went to watch Angus's old team in the finals for Provincials one year and Ben came up to bat, a kid behind me who sounded about ten said confidently "That's Ben Adams, who's the brother of Angus Adams who went to the LLWS two years ago". He sounded so certain I was like, is it possible he is better-versed in the previous occupants of my uterus than I am?

Eve has been having a very un-fun period while I've been sick, and Lucy has spent many days going back and forth like oh no, both women are down, who do I comfort first? One night while I was still reading Eve came in my room at about two a.m. with a monster cramp that wouldn't let up, and her body's pain response is always alarming - she gets pale, her pulse gets thready, she passes out, it's a whole big thing. She laid down with me and I went downstairs to heat up the rice pillow and then rubbed her back. Fortunately the heat did the trick. She went back to her bed a half hour or so later saying "thank god I have a mommy who doesn't sleep at night", so what do you know, maybe everything IS for a reason.

I still have no voice. If I was the kind of librarian that always shushed people I might say this was divine justice, but I'm not, so maybe the divine whatever could give a girl a break. 

And I have been having the craziest fun times with old people lately. My doctors office is right by an Independent grocer so yesterday after my appointment I went to the garden center to grab a few things to plant because the garden center is outside and I wouldn't be a pariah if I coughed. This old Greek woman nabbed me because she couldn't reach the tomato plants and she said "in my country we say the tall person is the slave to the short person" which, um, but she was very sweet, and we figured out the different kinds of tomato plants (pineapple tomatoes? Intriguing) and picked out all the ones with the thickest stems and she was very grateful.

Today I stopped for a couple of things on my way home from work (where I wasn't supposed to be) and as I was unloading my cart into my car an older woman came up with her cart and said "would you like me to return yours too?" (I was between her car and the cart return). I said "oh, I can return yours", but she seemed bent on grabbing mine, so I put the last bag in and hit the button to close the back, and she said "don't forget your avocado". I saw there was an avocado still in the cart, which made me think I might have just inadvertently stolen an avocado, but I managed not to say that. I hit the button to make the back hatch go up again, and then it was confused and kept going the wrong way which was awesome, because now I had an audience. In the end I let her return the cart and she probably felt like she'd helped someone who really needed help. Circle of life, I guess.