When I was a kid and got sick—chicken pox, measles, or what my doctor termed “Virus X”—I took the opportunity to read as much as I could. “Real” books, comic books—I devoured them all.
As I wasn’t allowed out of bed till I’d been fever-free for 24 hours—those were my doctor’s rules in those days—and as I wasn’t much for watching TV (nor was there a set in my room), almost all I COULD do was read—but that was good enough for me. An avid reader, I spent hour after hour reading away the time of my “imprisonment” in my sickbed, and hardly minding the illness at all.
I have been sick since Saturday. I haven’t the luxury of lying abed—deadlines, you know—but I’ve had to take numerous breaks to go lie down, when I just felt too rotten to sit up at my computer any longer.
I don’t, however, read. I just curl up in a miserable little ball and lay there. My Kindle and two printed books are by my bedside. I never picked any of them up. I will shortly have to go inside and lie down again. I’m sure, however, that I won’t read.
This being sick stuff is no fun. What’s the point in being sick if you can’t read?