It goes like clockwork. Just as I'm finishing up my last class of the week on a Thursday evening, I feel a little twinge in my throat. I look at the girl sitting next to me who's been coughing on my desk for the past 50 minutes and glare at her. She looks like death in a pair of Ugg boots.
Earlier, when she wiped her nose with the back of her hand and passed me the class handout, I wished I'd had some antibacterial spray in a fire extinguisher to unleash on her and the six meter contaminated zone she'd spread about her. I try not to touch anything, not to breathe and think healthy thoughts. I'm not coughing like her; my throat only hurts when I swallow. I can defeat this.
I go about the rest of my evening ignoring my throat, perhaps popping a few Airborne throat lozenges. I eat dinner and pretend that solid foods feel good. My friends make plans to go out, find parties, watch movies, and I pretend I'm not horrified at the thought of walking across campus and exposing my nasal passages to arctic temperatures. I make a weak attempt at having a social life and am mocked mercilessly as I head home early to get my requisite eight hours of sleep.
Friday morning I wake up unable to swallow. My solution is to chug some tea to get down Vitamin C tablets - this is not a full-blown cold, it is merely the result of sleeping with my mouth open. I will get through this. The sore throat goes away for a while as I tackle some homework, meet friends for dinner ... and promptly pass out at 8:30 p.m.
Saturday I wake up and wonder who I can pay to carry me to Health Services. Could I roll down my street and hope I don't land in busy traffic? I briefly consider calling a cab to take me two blocks, but instead I bundle up and stagger down Packard. Other pedestrians cross the street as I approach.
I get to Health Services promptly at opening time, but somehow there are four other students in front of me. I have brought some reading to work on in the waiting room, but my eyes are fuzzy and instead I doze off. A nurse calls my name and I knock over the basket of condoms next to me before slinking off to an examining room. Here comes the fun part.
"Yes I sleep enough, probably more than most toddlers. Yes I eat well, except for occasional meals of those little smiley-faced potato things at Carmichael. No I don't smoke, but I think my apartment might have asbestos, does that count?" After an exam, tests for strep and mono are conducted. They take my blood (hey, don't I need that?) and I wait slumped over on a couch before being told I have nothing to worry about, it's just an old-fashioned cold. If I don't get better in a few days, I should come back.
The rest of the weekend I model my favorite pajamas around the apartment. I rummage through my cookbooks for recipes that are mushy or liquefied, but I'm too tired to make it to the grocery store to assemble the ingredients. Occasionally, I use my croaking voice and threaten to lick my housemates if they tell me about the parties they're going to later. I fall asleep during "Golden Girls" and have fevered dreams of Bea Arthur transforming into a bottle of Sudafed. I wake up and consider moving to Miami.
By Sunday I am well enough to stare at my textbooks without the words swimming in front of me, but my recovery has not brought any higher understanding of math theorems.
Classes start up again Monday and I console myself about my wasted weekend by saying, "At least I don't have that stomach thing." (This is where I suddenly clutch my stomach and lean over a garbage pail).
Finally, I'm feeling better, ready to get on track. I jump into the week ready to rejoin the world as a functioning member of society - only to find that everyone and their professor is sick, and they're all blaming it on me.
Kate Peck is a junior majoring in English. She can be reached at Katherine.Peck@tufts.edu.
