The Medium C
So. I’m looking at the world from Boo Radley’s perspective these days.
I have the C. Not the Big C, but it ain’t little either. Call it medium. I have the Medium C. I’m taking suggestions for “little C”, by the way. I’m thinking…colitis.
I’ve today tested positive for Covid-19. The Medium C. An increasingly not-so-exclusive member of Club Covid.
Just to be clear. I am fine. I’m young. I’m fit, of soundish mind (I have two children under three) and lucky. And I know it, too.
My only symptom is Anosmia, or lack of smell and, thus, taste. Being the gourmand that I am, this is my own special form of hell, and believe you me once this is over I won’t take taste for granted again. Going out for dinner with me will be an hours-long affair as I chew each morsel purposefully and meditatively. Have fun watching me as I contort my jaw with each bite.
l’ll gladly accept this, hopefully temporary, charge in exchange for not being 400th in line for a ventilator. If anything, assuming now ten days into being symptomatic that I don’t take a turn, I feel a strange mix of gratitude and guilt. Gratitude for feeling fine and guilt for… feeling fine. I think about that nearly every second from my spare bedroom/office/ hell it could be a bathroom too as I can’t smell a damned thing. Everybody poops. Get over it.
Don’t pity me, please. For one, my circumstances don’t deserve it. For another, I have a Peloton. And people with a Peloton immediately forfeit their right to curry sympathy from anyone. It’s right there in the sales agreement, just before the requirement that you place it before a bay window with a view of the Alps and after the inclusion that, should this be a gift, it must be given passive-aggressively. The third strike against me? I just described myself using the word gourmand, for crying out loud. Oh! Woe is me! How will I ever survive not being able to enjoy New York’s expansive array of fine dining takeout?
Pity my wife, who has taken on more than she has bargained for caring for a tornado of a two- -year-old and a two-month-old who pees a lot, both of whom I feel have gotten a lot older over the past week (funny how that is- I’ve been away longer on business trips and haven’t felt this way then). She’s been fantastic and strong throughout this experience and, when it’s over, will earn a well-deserved healthy-quarantine period of her own.
And yet, here I sit seemingly a pariah amongst my peers. A curious case. That guy they know with the “‘Rona”. Of course, I am those things. Of course, I am also not.
I look out my window at the beautiful weather (that is, when not keeping the blinds closed and the “rainstorm” sound machine option on high) and see groups of people walking in tight packs. They are invincible, I guess. I am not.
Still, if on one of those walks you’d like to come up to my window and see what a semi-symptomatic Covid patient looks like, please do. Say “Hi”. Stare at me like I’m an exhibit in at a museum. You don’t know what you’re gonna get, really. Maybe I’ll dance the Macarena. Perhaps I’ll play the only three guitar chords of the only guitar song I know on loop. I may moon you. Whatevs.
You see, this thing we’ve been learning about in the news? It turns out it extends beyond a daily press conference and empty roads. It’s very real and very real, and very fake, people alike contract it just the same. It could happen to you or your elders, heck it just probably might, so if you think you have any symptoms, do what you can to get it checked out. And if you get it, and are lucky to get it like I have so far, take the time to think, not consume. You just might take the time to thank your lucky, tasteless, chickens.
I happened to get the Medium C while young and healthy. Next pandemic? Who knows. I better keep myself in good shape. Good thing I have that Peloton.
Take Care, Really.
PS: So I just sprayed Lysol and got a faint whiff! Never did dimethyl benzyl ammonium saccharinate smell so good!
