By John Carlson—
Since a nasty cold struck Nancy and me recently, I have been thinking a lot about illness. What I have been thinking about illness is that, even in these deadly pandemic days, just catching a stupid old-fashioned cold is no barrel of monkeys.
It calls for preparation!
Grabbing tissues, Tylenol and our fancy digital thermometer, I reread the instructions to press its little button for two seconds, then stick the skinny end into the far reaches of one’s mouth for a minute to get a reading.
That sounded about right. But then I read a little further. It said you could also take your temperature by sticking the skinny end in an armpit.
An armpit?
This gave me a moment’s pause. See, part of the reason Nancy and I are so compatible is that we are both dedicated mouth-temperature-takers. But life is change, right? Was it possible someday I’d take my temperature right after Nancy took hers, then find myself hollering, “Honey! Why does our thermometer taste like Lady Speed Stick?”
Yeah, that could happen.
And by the way, I’m not even gonna get into this fancy thermometer’s third “where to stick it” option …
Anyhow, the worst thing about getting sick is it’s an unpleasant deviation from the comfortable norm. At least it is at our house, where we almost never get sick. But when we do get sick, we use the occasion to explore the entire range of physiological responses common to such illnesses, all in a bid to elicit spousal empathy.
One of those responses is disturbing nasal noises.
Admittedly, my nasal noises are just so-so.
But while Nancy doesn’t like to brag about hers, when she has a cold, she is like the Aretha Franklin of making disturbing nasal noises. Millions of years ago, I would wager, entire species of dinosaurs went extinct while making less disturbing nasal noises than Nancy, suffering from a cold, does while sitting through a single episode of “Jeopardy.”
In other ways, though, I’m just as disturbing.
Sitting on our couch by the hour, listless, moaning and groaning, my throat gets scratchy as sandpaper while my sinuses drain like somebody left a faucet running. Miserably lifting my arms heavenward, I beseechingly wonder why I – a model husband if there ever was one – am being so unfairly punished by God?
Is it for all the times I have failed to pray for an end to world hunger while watching my hero, Guy Fieri, stuff another quadruple cheeseburger into his face on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives? Is it for stealing money from Nancy’s purse to buy Twizzlers? Is it for telling her I watch the Smithsonian Network in my man-cave at night when I’m actually watching hot, sweaty lady cage fighters like Liz “Girl-Rilla” Camouche kicking the living dickens out of other hot, sweaty lady cage fighters?
OK, maybe I’m not a model husband after all.
But for a moment, let’s move on from illness, there being lots of other misery in the world.
I have also been thinking about pain and injury. What spurred this was falling out of bed a couple weeks ago. One thing about falling out of bed is, you can pretty well figure it’s nobody’s fault but your own. My pain upon hitting the floor in a bloody lump, however, was tempered by the fact that mercurochrome has been banned in the U.S. since 1998. Sure, The Greatest Generation is rightly honored as the one that saw America through the Great Depression and World War II.
But we Baby Boomers? We were the Mercurochrome Kids.
What evil genius invented that vile elixir I don’t know. Obviously, it was somebody who hated children. When I was a kid, our little bottle of mercurochrome haunted its own special space in our medicine cabinet, sort of as a silent reminder not to act stupid. Still, inevitably a buddy would challenge you to some idiotic stunt, you’d respond with, “OK, hold my Choc-ola,” and end up bleeding all over your Red Ball Jets.
Growing up, I remember thinking I’d rather have a broken bone reset while biting on a length of bamboo than endure another dose of mercurochrome applied to what Mom so casually called “ouchies.”
Nevertheless, in keeping with Mom’s gentle ways and vocabulary, it was obvious when applying mercurochrome to her beloved offspring that it hurt her far worse than it hurt us.
But Dad? He was a different story. Being a tough-love devotee, he applied mercurochrome to our wounds like Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer whitewashed a fence. But I never complained, mostly because I couldn’t fit the words around my heartrending screams. In fairness, though, Dad’s folks probably couldn’t afford luxuries like mercurochrome when he was a kid. For all I know, being of Viking stock, my Grandma Hulda soaked his “ouchies” in aquavit – which is Swedish for “explosive potato vodka” – then ignited them with a torch to save money on Bandaids.
That probably hurt worse than mercurochrome, but not by much.
Thankfully, kids today can take comfort in the fact that mercurochrome is no longer around. Now if modern medicine can find a way to get rid of the common cold, too, life will be even more pleasant.
John’s weekly columns are sponsored by Beasley & Gilkison, Muncie’s trusted attorneys for over 120 years.
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A former longtime feature writer and columnist for The Star Press in Muncie, Indiana, John Carlson is a storyteller with an unflagging appreciation for the wonderful people of East Central Indiana and the tales of their lives, be they funny, poignant, inspirational or all three. John’s columns appear on MuncieJournal.com every Friday.
