On Monday, Tara came down with a cold.
In retrospect, that’s not too surprising. Saturday, we spent several hours in a house chock full of little kids. I don’t even know how many there were. Eight? Ten? 100? It was a joint birthday party for Tara’s nephew and another kid, and turned out to be a lot of fun, but anytime you have a herd of children in a small enclosed space, germs will inevitably be flying around willy-nilly because kids don’t always wipe their noses, or they do wipe their noses and then reach inside the bag of potato chips that you will snack on next. It happens.
Anyway, she came home sniffling and sneezing and coughing, and felt downright miserable. After dinner, in a show of solidarity, I grabbed her fork and licked it. I thought this was a sweet and romantic gesture, right up until the point when she said, “Why on earth did you do that?!”
Umm…
“We’re in this together, dear,” I said. Besides, I thought, with the amount of saliva we’ve been swapping…
“I guess it doesn’t matter, with the amount of saliva we’ve been swapping,” she said a moment later, echoing my sentiments. Exactly! The damage, if there is any, had already been done.
Besides, I rarely get sick. I am blessed with good jeans! They’re Levi’s, and boy are they comfortable. Err…I’m also blessed with good genes. Thanks, mom and dad! It’s been three years since I’ve had so much as a cold. In retrospect, my fork-licking was an act of cockiness given my propensity for good health. I was almost daring those germs to try and get me! I’ll admit, later that evening, when my beloved was lying in bed miserable, a sheen of Mentholatum coating her philtrum while she blew her nose in between coughing spurts, I thought that maybe my gesture of solidarity had been ill-advised. There are plenty of ways to support your partner when she is sick, such as making her tea and propping up her pillows. Willingly slurping up the same germs circulating through her body might be construed as a tad extreme, but second-guessing my actions at that point was useless. Besides, it’s a few days later now, and I feel fine. I’m fortunate to hardly ever get sick. The downside is, when I do get sick, I tend to whine about it. Darling, you have been warned.
By the way, you’d think she’d be happy that I’m a healthy guy who never gets sick, right? This morning when I told her cheerfully “I still feel fine!”, she snarled, “bite me.”
Ain’t love grand?
Freshly Unimpressed
So, there’s this “thing” with WordPress called Freshly Pressed, where a select group of blogs are chosen by a mysterious cadre of WordPress editors and featured daily. The exposure is off the charts: said post will receive hundreds of hits and comments and introduce a whole new audience to your blog, some of whom will theoretically stick around. Many of my favorite bloggers have been Freshly Pressed, some of them, multiple times. It’s a great honor, and coveted by many who write here. I’m not sure how the algorithms work, or what the humans are looking for, but I have never been one of the chosen ones. I used to fixate on this, and even try to craft my posts to appeal to a wide audience, but I soon grew bored with that venture and just figured if it’s meant to be, it’ll happen. Writing here is a release; I don’t need virtual awards or recognition.
Just cash. Feel free to donate. I have a PayPal account.
I kid, I kid. (Well, I do have a PayPal account, so if you really want to…). What amazes me about blogging is the people who stumble across your writing. In the past couple of years, I have received comments from Loretta Swit’s cousin, the grandchildren of the man who invented Fettucini Alfredo, the belly dancer whom I lusted after, and – most recently – a representative of the Underwood Company, who responded to my post in which I declared my love for their chicken spread. I think this is way cool, and better than any accolades that might be bestowed upon me. Blogging opens up the world around you, it turns out, and you never know who is paying attention.
The downside, of course, is – you never know who is paying attention.
Related articles
- In Sickness And In Health (lobotomiseme.wordpress.com)
- Freshly Pressed (seventhvoice.wordpress.com)
Mark My Words 
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