In almost 32 years of marriage, this phenomenon has never surfaced. It’s almost like the lunar eclipse, it’s that rare: Nancy and I were simultaneously sick.
Sick in simpatico.
It all began with him.
He awakened me at 5:30 a.m. with this proclamation: “I sneezed.”
“Woman up!” I snapped.” Blow your honker and go back to sleep.”
He woke me up at 6:30 a.m. “My throat hurts…” he whined.
“Well, don’t swallow! Put a pillow over your face and don’t breathe at all.”
An hour later: “Yep. I’m definitely sick.”
And. It began. “Nancy’s Annual Trail of Tears, Whines and Dramatic Sneezes.”
He was sick. Everything stops. Life stops. My plans stop. My patience stops. Sleep stops. Especially sleep.
Here’s what didn’t stop:
He, with a blocked nose, inexplicable helicopter-snoring and spitting as he slept, spread his bronchial-infused germs all over me. He wouldn’t sleep in the spare room … and honestly, neither would I, because we are both Baby Boomer spoiled brats who require the drone of a TV to fall asleep. So pathetic. So essential. So 2018.
I awakened him at 5:30 the next morning. “I sneezed,” I gasped. ” My throat hurts. I can’t breathe! I cannot breathe!” I gasped.
Still completely cocooned within his Nyquil-infused coma, he harrumphed, coughed up a fur ball and turned over.
That bastard got me sick.
And so, Mr. & Mrs. Mucus were united in phlegm, inflamed lungs and a bottomless bucket of misery. It was so ugly. So ugly. Like, Earth Shoes ugly. We were two peas in an iron lung. Because I was certain polio was next on the menu.
It was a competition. Who was more sick? Who should let the dogs out? Who should grab soup? Who was generating more spit-up? I always felt I was more sick because I’m an asthmatic and as such, it was touch and go for me. I could expire at any moment. He felt he was more sick because he is a man. I couldn’t do the laundry because I just hacked up a small Somalian Village into my Puffs with Lotion. My breath was as raspy and labored as George C. Scott in Patton. I was super-gross.
Things got even uglier when the Nyquil supply ran low. We would both run and grab at it, like two addicts willing to kill each other with serrated grapefruit spoons in order to suck the last drop of salvation from that iconic triangle-shaped vessel. I, of course, was able to seize and gulp faster than Nancy, thanks to my degree in Quarters at Penn State. I slammed that crap down faster than he could figure out the childproof cap. Rookie.
Again, karma.
Who is still sick, one week later?
Me. Not him. Me.
This is payback for how awful I was when he was sick. Someone is punishing me for drinking all that Nyquil and hiding the bags of Cherry Ricola and the good tissues. I was evil, and he is 100% better. I have a heating pad on my chest and he is at a party.
He won. He won the sick competition.
But! Not so fast. I just licked every single serrated grapefruit spoon.
#whowinsnow?
