General Malaise!

I have an empty head today. I came home from work yesterday, exhausted, collapsed onto the couch and immediately fell asleep for one of those unsatisfying naps, where you wake up with cotton in your mouth and a feeling that someone might have stuffed your head with gym socks while you were unconscious. I don’t think I’m sick but wonder if it’s just general malaise…a term my mom used to throw out when I was out of sorts and cranky. “You have general malaise!” she would say, “Go walk around the pool three times! You’ll feel better!” It shows my deep faith in her that I never questioned her diagnoses and would, in fact, go do my laps and return, declaring myself healed just out of fear that she might force me into further activity.

It was, however, too hard yesterday to get off of the couch and consider doing laps of any sort. One of the delights of being an adult is that I have the option of pulling the blanket up around my head, watching Law & Order reruns and eating ice cream sandwiches as a solution to feeling unwell. And while I’m sure my mothers German Solutions Towards Wellness™ pushed me towards being a more productive adult, prone to push through illness rather than succumbing to it, it’s nice to be able to wallow once in a while when nothing else seems like it will help.

There will be a time, I know, when my mom will no longer be with me. Should I be blessed enough to have children, I hope to pass on her legacy by making them walk their illnesses off, force them towards health with ministrations of her electrolyte soup (don't ask), that I insist that they shower frequently while sick, that they sleep in a bed with linens that have been changed after each shower and that there is frequent exposure to fresh air, regardless of the weather. It seemed to work for me, and I'll be damned if I let any child of mine be less lovingly pestered than I was when I had to stay home sick. So there.