Time breaks

I'm still recovering, although from something other than the five-week cold or the death cold. Those, thankfully, are over. Now it's one red, irritated, itchy eye, my lower back acting up (it only responds to red wine. Really.), and a sore throat. Will I ever be well again? I think it's been seven weeks total, and it has robbed me of some of my basest pleasures-- the taste of food, the sweetness of exhaustion from digging in the dirt, and the satisfying ring of words clicking into place.

Quite a few scenes have moved me recently-- the purple shock of first magnolia blossoms, rain seen flung like the sheerest silk scarf far across the Willamette Valley, the sweet solo of the first spring birdsong. But in experiencing these things with my senses so crippled, no words well up. I remember fewer details. Time rolls on without me. And that is why I started taking Airborne, EmergenC, a multivitamin, and some more targeted vitamins. I'm tired of a half-life, and ready for my synesthesia back.

The sound

With this cold I've had over the past four weeks, I have lost fluency with my words. The already tenuous tendrils between my everflowing mind and the outside world of reality were washed away in the tidal floods of mucus filling my sinuses. With my smell, taste, and hearing dulled, the whole sensory package seemed to take a break. It's been forever. I'm nearly there.

The story I've wanted to tell, for weeks now, is of awaking in bed one morning without opening my eyes. I had time to sleep in because it was one of those odd holidays that few people get, so I feigned sleep, deeply aware of my head on the pillow and the blankets holding in my sleep-heat. Because of this not-fully-conscious state, I was able to hear the sounds clearly-- the sounds I always hear in my ears, which normally I filter out enough to completely ignore. I listened and thought about it, as I haven't really ever tried to describe it.

They were metal sounds, only in my left ear-- the ear against the pillow. Quick and short, but in unhurried and random intervals. I think if I heard those sounds in real life they would grate, but the subtly shifting patterns were oddly comforting. I listened for twenty minutes before finally stirring and rising out of bed. I had previously described the sound as a wailing alarm, but that's not it at all. It comes and goes in endless layers, which give a siren-effect when hidden by the normal noise of everyday life. But with this cocooning cold I've been able to hear more details in the sound, to concentrate on its complexity. I'm familiarized with it, and that's something good that's come from this otherwise frustrating and drawn-out illness.