I caught a cold on Friday. It started out with a sore throat and eventually ended up in my sinuses. It wasn’t a particularly bad cold. I’ve had much worse. I could have panicked. I could have called my doctor, freaked out that it was “the COVID”. But I didn’t.
I’ve lived on this earth for nearly six decades so far and I’ve had my share of colds. Needless to say, this wasn’t my first rodeo. So, I didn’t run out and get tested and I didn’t start wearing a mask in my own damn home. It was just a cold.
I did what I always do when I get a cold. I took naps when my body told me it was tired, and I ate whatever my body told me it was hungry for. I drank a lot of electrolytes and sucked on popsicles and cough drops. Because it was just a cold.
I know that if I take it easy and let my immune system do its thing, the cold will be gone in three or four days. Because that’s what always happens. Sure, it’s going to feel like forever. But, in reality, it’s only three or four days.
The last time I was sick was June of 2019. I remember that specifically because I had the flu on my birthday. And it sucked. I could barely get out of bed for 4 days. But this? This was nothing. This was just a cold.
Having not gotten even a little bit sick last year, I had yet to see how I’d react if I had COVID-like symptoms. It’s possible that I just talk a big game and would act exactly like the idiots and morons I’d been making fun of for the past 15 months. Maybe I’d panic.
Nope. Not me. I was cool as a cucumber. Not even for a single moment did I think it was anything other than a cold.
I didn’t “self-quarantine” this weekend and I’m not doing it today. I still take my dog out for walks, and I still don’t wear a mask. If a neighbor stops me and wants to talk, I do what I always do when I have a cold. I tell them I have a cold and let them decide how far away they want to stand.
Like I said, I could have panicked. But I didn’t. I had many of the myriad of symptoms that indicate I had contracted COVID-19. Sore throat and stuffy nose? Sure, it could be COVID-19, or it could just be a cold. Yeah, I had a sore back (I still do). But is it because I had COVID-19 or because I was carrying stuff up and down a ladder last Thursday? I’d say it’s more likely my back is sore because I was pretending to be younger than I actually am.
I might have even had a temperature. Well, I’m sure I did have a temperature since even dead people have a temperature. I’ll be more specific. I might have even had a temperature higher than 98.6°F (that’s 37°C for those of you smart enough to understand the metric system). But I’ll never know. Because I don’t own a thermometer.
My sense of smell, which isn’t great on a normal day, seemed to get better. Maybe I’ve got a mutant variant of COVID-19 (let’s call it COVID-X?) that gave me super-smelling superpowers. But probably not. It’s more likely that my sense of smell didn’t change at all, and it was just a cold.
If you look at the list of potential symptoms for COVID-19, it’s longer than I am tall. And, since many people who have COVID-19 don’t even know it, feeling well and healthy is also a symptom of COVID-19. So, logically, I should have been exactly the same amount of concerned on Thursday when I was feeling well and healthy as I was on Friday when my throat started getting scratchy.
As it turns out, I was exactly the same amount of concerned. Because I wasn’t concerned at all. Not on Thursday or Friday. Or Saturday. Or Sunday. My concern level was at, and remains at, zero. Because it was just a damn cold.
