26 January 2018

I’m not a life in the fast lane kind of girl.  I NEED  to take life slowly, whether I do or not.   Rushing around “like a chicken with my head cut off” doesn’t do me or anyone else in my vicinity any good.  I forget things.  I lose things, my phone, my keys, my purse, my  mind.  I’m half-witted, half-assed, ALL a fluster.

Apparently, speed doesn’t only affect my mental state, it affects my physical state as well.  I NEED to move slowly, travel slowly.  Quick trips makes me sick, literally, and there is no other mode of transportation that gets me there quicker and makes me sicker than flight.

Every single time I fly the friendly skies, whether on a crop-duster or a jetliner, I become ill.  Mostly I get a headache, a dull ache that is cured with a Tylenol or two.   Often, however, these headaches turn into migraines–head-holding,  pulse-throbbing, light-flashing, jaw-locking, teeth-aching, neck-stiffening, vein-tingling searing pain migraines.  Down for a day, maybe two; exactly what you don’t need on a business trip or want on a vacation.

Then there are the digestive system disorders–the rumbly -tumbly types.   You know of which I speak.

Nausea is also a frequent malady, as a tag-a-long with a migraine or on its own,  rising up every once in a while to something more, but thankfully never on a plane.

Laryngitis, colds and flu, yes I’ve gotten those too, like the time I traveled to Australia, boarding with a voice and stepping off without one.  Nary a sound could pass my lips, NARY, none, zilch, zero.  First stop:  apothecary.  Second stop: bed.  It gave new meaning to the phrase “down under.”  Down for the count and under the weather.

Perhaps it isn’t the speed that gets to me but the altitude affecting my inner ear.  Perhaps it is merely my close proximity to a hundred or more passengers breathing in and out their germs into the cram-jammed confines of the cattle car cabin.  Or perhaps it is the recycled air system drying out my nose and throat and lowering my resistance to virus and bacteria.  Perhaps it is all of the above and SPEED.  Regardless, yesterday I flew, today I’m feeling sickly.