Nearly Always Sick

I stayed home today.

I suppose this is home now. Over half a year has passed since I moved into this room, so I have some claim to the dings on the floor and stains on the walls. I'll be the responsible one when I leave, and someone notices the imprint of a map of the area sealed into the paint by nights of wet hair rubbing it against the wall. Even the cockroaches which may or may not still be living here with me are somewhat products of my habitation.

My earlier claims of having never seen the face of the girl living in the room to the side of mine, as I am the last in the hall, are no longer valid. A few days ago, as I was biking to the nearest, and sadly not so near train station, I followed a girl for most of the way. I thought there was a good chance that she lived at the same complex as I, but didn't give it much thought. This is a large facility. There should be around 600 people here. That evening, as I was heading up the stairs and through the coded door, I saw her again. She and I walked down the same hall for nearly the same time. She opened the door to the left of my room and swept herself in before I could muster any sort of greeting. Good evening? Is my music too loud? Where are you from? What are you studying? Another time, I suppose. Or maybe not.

This really is proving itself to be a year of varying ailments, though. I've been sick before, sure. But I'm beginning to feel like I spend more time sniffling into the tissues I pick up on the street from part-timers at the local host and hostess clubs than i do healthy. But what's healthy? Physical health, I guess. At least, that's the angle I'm working for this particular moment.

Before this year, I would have thought it mad to think that I could get whooping cough. I thought that my mother was going overboard with vaccinations when she told me to get another pertussis shot in early 2007, along with some other oddball vaccinations, like Japanese encephalitis, before I left that home. In the end, I guess it didn't really matter that I went ahead and was immunized for pertussis. It was more of just another chance to say goodbye to the nurses working in the immunization clinic who I had grown to know and love through a couple years of frequent visits for allergy immunotherapy. Whooping cough still took me out of commission for a few weeks, even with heavy dosages of antibiotics.

Just as I recovered from one thing, there would be about a week of calm before the next strike.

I'm out again. Hopefully just a cold. But I'm overdoing it again, and it won't get better if I keep at it.