This month, events in our home conspired to alter my usual optimistic outlook. You see, instead of being able to look through rose-colored glasses, I was peering out through eye sockets infected with a bad case of pink-eye. And it wasn’t just the pink-eye that colored my view. In the last three weeks we’ve had multiple plagues descend upon our house.
We’ve had strep throat (my son Cole), head lice twice (Cole, my daughter Sammie, and I), hellish 24-hour flu (Sammie threw up 14 times from midnight to 8 am) along with nasty chest colds and lingering coughs (Cole, my husband Wade and I). In the middle of all of this, Cole swallowed a marble, so every time he went to the bathroom, I had to look for it until it came through (if you know what I mean).
We stopped getting visitors to our house. Even my sister exercised caution and stayed away. And who could blame her…if I didn’t live here, I wouldn’t visit either.
“Well,” I told myself, “Welcome to planet Earth.” The life force that gives rise to all of our noble human thoughts about the past and future is the same one that compels lice to infest our heads, viruses to infiltrate our throats and noses, and bacteria to permeate our eyes. That life force even propels a marble right through a digestive tract.
As humans, we like to think we’ve risen above the state of other life on the planet…that we live mostly in our intellect. But we are trapped in our physical bodies just like all of the other life on Earth. And it’s surprising to realize that something as small as a louse–or even something smaller, like a microscopic strep bacterium–can make us so miserable.
But it wasn’t all bad. When we discovered the lice, the kids couldn’t go to school so after the shampoo treatment and the comb-through, we spent the whole day together. We played hookey from our normal routine. We rode bikes, swam in my parent’s pool, ate lunch at a restaurant, and watched a video together. At bedtime both kids said it was the best. It was like getting a snow day off in my home state, Nebraska. One whole, unexpected extra day to ourselves to do whatever we wanted.
When I learned that we would have to comb through our hair, section by section, every day for two weeks to make sure we got all of the nits out, I dreaded that chore. But by the end of the two weeks, I was sorry to see it go. Sammie sat in front of me and I combed her hair and Wade sat behind me and combed my hair. How often do you get to spend a half-hour combing your daughter’s beautiful long hair? How often does your husband spend a half-hour combing your hair? It was a pause in our routine…a bonding, therapeutic break.
When Sammie and I had the flu, we threw up so much that we finally moved our pillows and blankets to the bathroom and slept there. When Sammie was over the toilet, I rubbed her back and held her hair…and since we were in the same predicament, she did the same for me. Along with me, she was learning and practicing how to take care of someone who is sick.
And when I did find the marble, Cole told me, “I love you mommy.” I realized at that moment, he knew I cared about him and he felt loved. It’s easy to feel and express love when everyone is clean and shiny and happy. It means more to feel love when your head is over a toilet or your hands are in poop or someone is pulling lice eggs out of your head.
Who wants to watch a movie or read a book where every day is the same and only good things happen? If we’re lucky, life is not a carousel…every turn of the earth does not bring the very same view again and again. The human condition is a roller coaster. There are ups and downs. Without sadness we wouldn’t recognize happiness. Without sickness, we couldn’t appreciate health. We need shadows as well as light to see.
So when events leave you scratching your head (hopefully NOT from head lice), it’s best to remember that life is not supposed to run as smoothly as a marble through a five-year-old. And while it may seem that the parasites and viruses and scum of the earth are getting a foothold, they don’t hold on forever.
What do I want to remember from the last year? How about the good things and the bad, the tragedy and the comedy, the joy and the grief? How about everything?
What does the next year hold? I can’t predict but I know it will be bittersweet and unpredictable and in the midst of the trials and tribulations, there will be surprising moments of sweetness and light.
~Written in January 2003
School of Thought 