Mouth-Breather

What? How am I doing, you ask? Kinda crappy, actually. I've been a little under the weather. Feeling puny. Looking peaked. Feeling groggy. Sick as a dog. White as a sheet. Pale as a ghost. Not ship-shape. Run down. Worn out. Half dead. Unable to breathe through my nostrils.

This past weekend, during the zenith of my misery, I caught myself reflecting on being home sick from school when I was in grade school. My mom would transform into Clara Barton, and my every need would be lovingly tended. My brow was smoothed, and soothed with damp washcloths. Bedding was straightened & tucked in. Pillows were plumped and shades were drawn. The vaporizer fogged the windows. The thermometer would be checked, and it would remain under my tongue for several hours before it was trusted for an accurate reading. At least, it seemed that way to me.

I always had a niggling fear in the back of my mind that I would bite through the thermometer by accident and die from mercury poisoning. I had no idea what this entailed, but in my mind my mother would return from a lengthy phone call to find me with my eyes rolled back in my head, mouth gaping, quicksilver drooling from my blue lips. My mother would wring her hands and sob "Darned that Catherine! I told her Billy was sick, and that I couldn't talk on the phone! Now look what I've done." This never actually occurred, as far as I know.

The best part about being sick was when the tide turned and I started feeling better. There was that golden moment when the crisis had passed, but I still looked like hell. I could play my mom for anything I wanted. She was grateful that I was responding to treatment, and I could look at her doe-eyed and ask if maybe she could make me a fold-over peanut-butter sandwich and then play Crazy Eights with me.

Did you have a favorite food when you were starting to recuperate? Mine was a peanut butter sandwich. No jelly. White bread lightly spread with butter; then peanut butter. Cut into squares, not triangles. That was my first foray back to the world of solid food. If that stayed down, my next skirmish was with Campbell's Tomato Soup. Made with whole milk, not water. And lots of crushed crackers.

Watching daytime television with Mom was always fun, too. Of course, my mother never sat down to watch television in the daytime. That would have put her on the fast track to becoming a fallen woman. Mom would iron clothes, the steam iron clicking & hissing, as I snuggled in bed, and we would watch the afternoon game shows. Mom's favorite was The Newlywed Game, but I preferred Let's Make a Deal. I liked the costumes that the contestants wore, and I was certain that my mother could do an even better job than Carol Merrill as Monty Hall's assistant. In fact, when we were in high school, Suzanne & I convinced Jim Tyer, a lower classman, that my mother was Carol Merrill in retirement.

Unfortunately, there was no Mom to place cold, refreshing washcloths on my hot brow this past weekend. I was left to my own devices when it came to administering medications at the proper intervals. I scrounged for food in my pantry & freezer until a neighbor took pity on me. Being sick is a lonely business when our mothers are gone.