My legs happily extended into bicycle pedals for twenty miles and suddenly I am on the cold, concrete floor outside of the grocery store waiting for my boyfriend to buy me ice cream. He finds me there, sick and fatigued, with stars floating in a circle over my head and I ask him if he will break up with me if I get sicker. From my stomach to my skittish ears, I am one beer in and it's saying bad things to me.
I have been sick since last summer and I haven't written about it. This glob of ache and cartoonish demon lives in my stomach and loves when I breathe its name. It being a point of mine to be truthful about my state of feeling, no matter the polite situation, has left me talking about my discomfort routinely. But I don't write about it because this is my time for myself and my heart. I'm not letting that crazy guy in this bar. This bar is awesome. It's better that he stays outside.
However, I was sitting in the grass a week ago and thinking very much about the infinite feedback loop that is trying to mentally diagnose myself or figure out which food is going to destroy this problem, thus saving me forever, and I began to write in an attempt to make thought travel from mind to out of mind. I wrote:
"I was up all night watching the movie Frida and throwing up the dinner I enjoyed. I miss Anthony Bourdain. Did he know illness like this? After all that fucking food he ate? I feel that I am in the middle of a losing game. Here, in a strange bodily limbo, I consider the mystification that is the experience of being unable to speak the same language as my own body. If I had one wish it would be solve this great enigma. Why do I feel so sick every single day?"
Only days later would I find myself outside of the grocery store with tears in my eyes and a tiredness I wouldn't even know how to begin to describe to you. My poor, gentle boyfriend walked inside to get us some ice cream after a long day of being in the sun and biking, not knowing that he would find a girl-wreck waiting for him by the bike locks. I hugged him tightly and asked him if he'd leave me if I didn't get better.
My sickness seems to be a component of everyday life for us now. It is always something to consider and it has cancelled many plans. My heart feels energetic, healthy. My body scolds and punishes me when I take chances or push myself. I worry that it exhausts him. Of course he loves me just the same. My aches and pains are obnoxious to me but maybe they aren't so abrasive to him. Maybe he is just patient. Loving someone makes me strong but being loved can turn me into a scared dog.
I asked God to take me through all the oncoming forks in the road with grace and love. I was there in the sun with date pits in my stomach and a yearning to be under the warmth of Spring with an untainted body. I wanted wind to blow and I wanted to go with it. The world is so big and beautiful. I am endlessly starving for it but do I have the stomach?
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