Last night I had my first deep night's sleep in days, and this morning I woke without a fever. Though I'm still congested and slightly sore-throaty, I feel like the blanket of illness is finally lifting. What a bizarre ordeal this has been. Yet while it's been unpleasant, it's also been interesting. Maybe this is just the writer talking, but I always like to learn new things, and now I have.

An illness powerful enough to create a pandemic is by definition a brutal one, and with Covid I have been sick enough to smell that medieval stench. But because I was vaccinated I was not in fear. So I was aware of both sides: what was actually happening as opposed to what could have been happening. I'm not writing very well yet (like, actually, physically, not typing very well yet), so I don't have the wherewithal to talk fully about this. But specifics--the peculiar placement of the sore throat, a sensation of bodily indifference as opposed to bodily fatigue--were cues to what, without vaccination, could have gone very wrong.