Of Arabica Seas and Salacious Headaches: A Hushed and Bemused Manifesto

[antiqrule1]

I went to bed with a headache and woke up four hours later because the pain was so terrible that I felt like throwing up. Took a steamy shower to get some relief, stepped out, then actually threw up. After brushing my teeth, I laid in bed, which made my head throb, but nonetheless couldn't stop thinking about all the sexual potentialities of my contorted body position. The throbbing overthrew my prurient thoughts and I rushed to the bathroom to throw up again. While brushing my teeth a second time - a bit disturbed by the softness and wetness of freshly-used toothbrush bristles - John's agonizingly sleepy voice called out to me from the pillow submerging his face; he wanted to know if I was alright. I groaned, walked back to the bed, laid down with my head at its foot and a little voice in the back of my head bawdily observed that I could be very alluring from that angle, and that if John's caveman homing device prevailed over his sleepiness, he'd be privy to what Neil Simon called "the Golden Palace of the Himalayas." I shifted slightly to help him out a bit and for a split-second, flattered myself by considering that the way in which my towel draped over my lower-body made me look like the subject of a Botticelli painting. I craned my neck to see if he was thinking that I looked like the subject of a Botticelli painting, too. His face was still smushed into the pillow, while moving my neck had inspired a tidal wave of pain to surge from the base of my cranium and break at its top, enveloping it. So I rolled out of bed, threw on whatever clothes were most easily accessible, and brewed some mud-thick coffee. I need to make a second pot now, but at least the pain is tolerable.

So far today, I feel alright emotionally and mentally. I'd give myself a 7, since I'm not necessarily delighted by the world. Plus, even my better moments are tainted by a sense of impending doom, a sense of my happiness's or contentedness's ephemeral quality; I've learned not to trust any pretense to emotional stability. But, a 7 is pretty good for today