1.22.2009

The Sleeper Awakens... and Coughs

Can I call 'em or what? The little throat tickle that I knew spelled trouble turned out to be the flu, and I've spent the vast majority of the time since my last post sleeping. Thankfully that seems to have helped a bit, though I'm not out of the woods yet. I get sick every winter, regardless of whether I've had a flu shot or how often I wash my hands. And while there's never a good time to get sick, I always seem to pick the worst time possible. Usually that means a full slate of projects at work or maybe a social function I don't want to miss. But this time it meant History with a capital H happening while I was asleep. It's all very Rip Van Winkle-esque... I went to bed on Monday night and came out of the fog two and a half days later into a world that had changed perceptibly in my absense. There's a small part of this that's actually kind of pleasant. Noticing that the world has changed overnight is an interesting new experience for me*, and chances are good that if I hadn't gotten physically sick I'd probably have burned out on inauguration overload. I'm glad that didn't happen. And it's not like what I missed is gone forever... YouTube is jammed with inauguration videos and Facebook has cornered the market on grainy cellphone pictures of... I'm not sure what exactly but apparently it's supposed to be inspiring. And, snark aside, it is. Best of all, though the world is noticibly different it's not like one of those "butterfly effect" differences where people have four spleens or Nutella was never invented. It's new and exciting in the good way; comfortable and safe in the good way. So far? I like it.

* Yes, it's the fine print. Above I said the sense that the world had changed overnight was new, but that's not 100% accurate. On the morning of September 11, 2001, as I watched the events unfold on live television, part of me probably knew the world was changing even quicker than "overnight" but the shock overwhelmed any such feeling long before I became aware of it.

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