I told my wife last night that my eyes were watery. That doesn’t happen to me a lot, that sort of hay fever-y reaction to something or another. I’m not really a very reactive person.

I had some trouble getting to sleep, and then the coughing started. It makes no sense to me, having spent so much time inside for the past couple of weeks, not social at all. When I got over my last cold, too, I was deadly serious about de-germing this house. Everything got washed in hot water, and I wore gloves and wiped every surface capable of being wiped.

And it’s been a couple of weeks, actually a little longer, since I was sick. This is something else. It doesn’t feel particularly serious, although this is day #1 of round #2, I guess, so your guess is as good as mine. I was hacking this morning, though, and even though I had some responsibilities at church and was literally walking out the door, all showered and combed and dressed, my wife finally shook her head and told me it was a bad idea. I already knew that but really didn’t want to let people down.

But it would have been at least four hours until I could get home again, and those could have been some miserable hours, no way of knowing, just guessing again. So I’m home, wondering if there are clothes I should burn or what. Seriously. I’ve been inside for a couple of weeks. The last time I was around a group of people, mingling and trading bacteria, was two weeks ago today, Super Bowl Sunday. The day of the first big snow.

There’s no joy in a sick day, then. I’m relieved of no responsibilities and have no special books to read or Netflix to binge. There’s the threat of more snow next week, and definitely more cold, and I’m starting to intuit a conspiracy to keep me indoors. There is no up side that I can see, other than hoping for a brief whatever this is, since we’re supposed to go to a concert tomorrow night. Where coughing is discouraged.