Woken up at 3:15 am by a coughing fit — not a good way to begin the day. A third of the campus is sick with the same cold, the same viral infection. The infirmary confirmed that last night with a campus-wide e-mail. Yack. The school nurse medicated me (Sudafed and Robitussin in pill form), but he says he’s only treating symptoms, not the cause. With this medication, my symptoms will last about two weeks. Without them, it’ll probably last fourteen days. Unless I have what Mr. and Mrs. A have, in which case I’ll be hacking, and coughing, and splurking up goo for three to four weeks, and waking myself up every two to three hours at night with wheezing. Didn’t even get a dream out of waking up — waking because you’re coughing yourself awake doesn’t seem to lend itself to dream recollection.
Joy.
I meant to post this yesterday, and forgot, what with everything else going on.
In the old Roman Calendar, yesterday (21 February) was the Ferinalia, the old Roman feast of the dead — lay food on graves, sweep the family tomb, that sort of thing. Today is the Concordia, the feast of the living, a time of reconciliation and good-will. Tomorrow is the Terminalia, the feast of Terminus the god of boundaries.
I guess the idea is that you go and visit the dead, and discover how short life is. Then you go make your peace with the living, so you can get on with living. Then you visit the boundaries in your life, and figure out which ones are worth defending, and which are worth crossing. It’s a nice triad of days in the middle of winter to cross between the dark of the year and getting ready for the light’s returning.
MEME:Write a three-part poem, or a triad of poems, dealing with the dead, the living, and the boundaries in your life. I’ll try to post mine later today.
