Sick
Monday, February 28, 2005
The last day of February (“Floral Design Day” – the celebration of floral art – as the radio announcer commented), brought a light dusting of snow to the ground.
Collette had had a rough past evening of it. During Sunday school she had begun to feel quite warm and by the time choir gathered on the risers for practice before the service, she felt ill. During the service, it somehow seemed to subside a little, but she did not even wear a coat for leaving into the cold air.
Meanwhile, OLeif left for a lunch meeting at Bandanna’s with Judah and Bob and Madge Wheels, the other youth directors. Rose left for a lunch and Bible study with the other girls, and Joe soon left for youth group.
At the house, Collette fell asleep on the couch, awoke later for some breakfast casserole, and as Carrie read “The Seven Sleepers” to Francis and Linnea, she began to feel queasy and fell asleep again as Carrie took a nap on the recliner. Then during another ghastly episode of Midsomer Murders, she began to feel quite miserable. Dad gave her several Tums, gathered a bag of them as well as of ibuprofen, and Carrie drove her home to meet OLeif. Once there, she took the prescribed medicine, and within half an hour, resting on the couch, she felt much better.
When she awoke in the morning, she felt perfectly normal, gathered the laundry, and sadly found one of her good wooden bowls (a wedding gift from Iwo and Strawberry) warped and cracked in the sink. Someone’s stir fry remains from Saturday night had been soaking too long and the water had done its damage.
But Collette was feeling too happy over recovering to lament long. It was the second wedding gift to bust. At least there were three other bowls. Several months earlier, OLeif had knocked over an amber glass goblet, shattering it quite spectacularly on the brick hearth, but Collette concluded that after having been married six months exactly, two breaks was hardly anything to complain about.
The weather was wonderful that morning in the biting cold gray of the skies and the hopes of an interesting day ahead.