The whole family is sick with the flu, but no one wants to cancel Christmas. Some family members have already been through the antibiotic phase and are now into the deep chested coughs that wrack their bodies. In spite of this, the tree is up, the presents are wrapped, and family obligations take priority.
The baby hardly ever cries, but today she is inconsolable. Everyone is sick of being sick. There is a knock on the door. When they open it, they are greeted by the Santa like figure of their grandfather. “Ho! Ho! Ho!” he sings in a deep baritone. He is there just in the nick of time making a delivery of joy and presents to the exhausted mother, an over-tasked father, and a crying coughing baby.
As “Santa” announces himself, the baby bursts into a smile for a moment forgetting her discomfort. “Ho! Ho! Ho!” he sings again, and this time she laughs in spite of herself.
Grannie remembers the nights of sleepless coughing, the days and weeks of sitting up in bed or on the couch… a lot of reading, quiet art work, coloring, painting, sitting quietly… feeling ill, short of breath, while her mother and father hover over her with cigarettes dangling from the corners of their mouths or lay sitting in an ash tray smoldering right next to her cough medicine and inhaler on the side table next to her bed.
The vaporizer is going, but she hates it. She prefers dry, hot air to the whirring steam that is pouring into her room making her feel smothered. By now she has missed three weeks of school with the two week vacation added on, and one extra week to make sure she is recovered, that will make a total of six weeks.
She is desperate for some age group association – friends. She is tired of daytime soaps and cartoons. She has been afraid to move because of the wracking coughing, the feeling of breathlessness. She tires to stay absolutely still, taking in only short shallow breaths.
A cold leads to bronchitis which leads to pneumonia aggravated by her ever present asthma. At this point a good Christmas present would be the gift of an easy breath. She practices deliberately taking deeper and deeper breaths exhaling by pursing her lips together and making a hissing noise. In this way she heals her lungs and expands her breath control into her diaphragm. By the time she reaches high school she will be able to hold a note for three minutes.
#MerryChristmas
First published 12/8/11)
