whining and pining is wrong and so

Here is one of the many problems with working with people who know too much about illness-

Richie Rich: Are you okay?
me: I am not long for this world.
RR: Me neither! I think I have the flu.
me: I am pretty sure I have strep throat.
RR: I have a cold sore, indicating immunosuppression.
me: Yes, but I am dying.
RR: Whatever, I think I have Kaposi's Sarcoma.
me: Well, I think I might be coming down with a mild case of sepsis.

We do this until one of us breaks out into laughter. It is admittedly infantile and in incredibly poor taste, but such is the way of the working drones. Especially those that are sufficiently under the weather to feel like a$$, but sufficiently well enough to put out the everburning fires that present themselves.

Even though I would thoroughly revel in the opportunity to bore everyone to tears with tales of my sinuses, tonsils, and congestive issues, I will limit myself to this observation: I really like the Gujarati word for cough. Some words in Gujarati just have better onomatopoeia than the equivalent in English.

Even though my head is foggy, I still feel confident in stating that I am listening to a brilliant song. I could and maybe will someday write an entire post about the first line of the song: once I wanted to be the greatest. That, alone, is perfection when set to music. Do you know it? If not, hold tight until next week- I feel certain that it will be keeping the dream alive then. Apparently, some people do not like it, but to them I say- your heart is made of colder steel than mine.

I want to write about unseasonably sunny days in Park Slope, spent drinking ginger-peach juice in a sweet restaurant and wandering around Prospect Park for hours. The familiarity of New York juxtaposed on the incongruity of visiting M there, M who is usually found in much warmer climes. M's referencing "blobs" and Brad Pitt, both wildly uncharacteristic mentions from her. The late night chats about why Williamsburg is not all that, breath-catching crushes, and choices in history that only family can share with such precise and overanalytical depth. Revelations that slipped out ten minutes before the train arrived to part us.

But that is the trouble with cramming so much into so little time. It takes space to decompress all that ground, to relax the memories into digestible portions. Or perhaps working out what it all meant is just not palatable. Some things are more beautiful as mysterious blurs, are they not?