Beech Tree News Network

Last week, I discovered what I had long suspected.  If left to myself, with no outside interference, I would soon become very tired of my own company.

                I woke on Monday morning with a cough and sinus pressure that I recognized to be the onset of a sinus infection.  I told my husband, Garey, I would not be going to work that day then called the doctor for an appointment.  By that afternoon, the symptoms were full-blown—sore throat, ear ache, sneezing, coughing and hoarseness.  I had taken the meds the doctor prescribed earlier that day and thought maybe, I could sleep it off, but it wasn’t happening.  There was nothing left to do but eat soup, drink hot tea and watch British mystery series from the comfort of my chair in the BBC room.

                I finished all the episodes of “Murder in Paradise,” tried to watch some “Broadchurch,” but found it too disturbing, and ultimately moved on to “Hamish Macbeth.”  I polished off two seasons before falling asleep on the Futon.  When Garey got home from work, he cracked the door a little to make sure I was still alive.  I told him to save himself and let me die in peace.  I woke a few hours later, took more meds, ate more soup, drank more tea, but this time decided to diversify the entertainment.  I worked a cross word puzzle, finished an owl collage my granddaughter and I had started the week before, and read a couple of chapters from three different books.

                Tuesday morning, I felt no better.  I told Garey to go on to work again without me.  “I’m not taking this stuff out in public to give to everyone around me, like whomever it was who took this stuff out in public to give to everyone around them,” I said.  I ate more soup, drank more tea and watched episodes of “Endeavor,” “Inspector Lewis,” and “Vera.”  By the end of the day, I could have passed the field exam for MI 6 (Britain’s CIA).

                I called to cancel the appointment I had on Wednesday to get my permanent crown put on a molar.  I got a text telling me my new glasses were ready.  They would also have to wait until the following week. 

                When Garey got home from work Tuesday afternoon, he sounded like I did.  “When you get up tomorrow morning, you get yourself to the doctor,” I told him.  He was standing in the doorway of the BBC room, looking at the depths to which I had sunk—trash can running over with used tissues, the plate of dried-out tea bags, the empty soup mugs, and worst of all, British accents emanating from the TV—Garey is no fan of British TV.  I knew I wouldn’t have to tell him twice to call the doctor.

                Our daughter, Natalie, called that night.  She’d left a paper at our house she desperately needed.  I told her if she had to come into our house, to wear a mask, some garlic around her neck and to carry a cross.  She was in and out in less than two minutes.  I was proud of her.

                On Wednesday, Garey got himself to the doctor early.  He got two shots, some antibiotics then came home and went straight to bed.  I started to plop myself down in my chair, but then thought better.  “Enough of this!” I told myself. 

                I took a shower, did two loads of laundry, swept the floor then collapsed onto the Futon.  My brain, my body and my will had turned to mush, and I was pretty sure I had begun to talk with a slight British accent.  “I’m going back to work tomorrow if I have to be on oxygen!” I said out loud.  I did.  Go back to work the next day, minus the oxygen tank.  It was good to be in the land of the living.

                I remember once, complaining to my sister, Marsha, about how my life seemed fraught with difficult relationships and situations.  “If it weren’t, you’d sleep-walk through life,” she said.  She was right, I would.  And I’d have a right proper British accent to show for it.