I've had a lot of trouble sleeping the past three nights, freezing/sweating/tossing/coughing, getting very little sleep and spiking a fever. During the day I feel okay, although not terrific. My sister thinks that my work is wearing on me, that the constant presence of death and sorrow is more draining than I realize. I suspect a virus of some kind, and I hope it goes away soon.
But my sister has a point. I remember when I took college psychology and started to see some level of dysfunction everywhere I looked and being sick this week has been a little like that. I have heard stories from people about how they thought they had a cold and here, a couple weeks later, they've been told that they are dying, a million freakish variations of people who are healthy and busy and then suddenly, almost instantly, incurably ill. In my job, I sit with them and hear their stories, trying to help them look death in the eye. Most of them have religious beliefs about death, although some do not. But regardless of religion, the diagnosis, when it comes, is always unexpected and the death, no matter how well prepared for, is always an awful surprise. So maybe those night sweats are my psyche's way of shaking off the pall.
But I'm pretty sure this darned cough is a virus!
On a more whimsical note, I saw the most elaborate car in a Kroger parking lot the other day. My photo doesn't do it justice, the entire car was decorated like a frosted cake, with bows and rhinestones and pearls. I would have loved to see who was driving it!
