Leap Day

 Happy Leap Day! Happens every four years, February 29th. An extra day. In my case today, it's an extra day to recover from bronchitis. Actually, probably to recover from a bug that affected me earlier in the month and, because I didn't take the time to fully recover before resuming my out and aboutness, morphed into bronchitis right when I had guests visiting from Canada for a week. Ugh.

We actually had a very good visit. I had guilt feelings about being possibly contagious but as one of my guests is a nurse and she didn't order me into isolation or flee our house, I decided I would just focus on hostess duties. I did notice, however, she was always scrubbing behind me.... I now have a much cleaner house than I normally do :)

I don't have any deep or pithy things to write today. I could write my dark thoughts about the current political situation in the world. My horror at social media, even while I still participate in it. My reflections on how I learn more from the people who are NOT like me than from people like me. Even though the latter are more comfortable to be around.

I could write about the books I've read but I've actually only read one this month, another great installment of Nicola Upson's Josephine Tey series. That was a high point of an otherwise kind of/sort of challenging February. I did watch loads of TV reruns, even taking a trip back to the 70s and Columbo when I was deep in the throes of flu in early February. Two seasons watched in a 101º haze, better mind numbing than drinking a bottle of whiskey (which I was tempted to do.)

I did want to check in, however, to reassure myself that I am still capable of thinking and writing--still capable of reflecting. In fact, one thing I reflected on this morning was that, even though it's been blindingly obvious to me this month that I cannot just leap from sick bed to full functioning and that viruses linger longer than any memories of jobs well done, I found myself thinking this morning that as I am no longer quite coughing my guts out, that I am well dosed with erythromycin and have my trusty inhaler to hand, I could sign up again for a sub job I had had to turn down for tomorrow. 

Seriously!!??? What does it take to get through to you girl??? Is your need to be validated in the public sphere so great, is the $135 you will get so tempting, that you will ignore hard cold evidence? (Supreme Court, are you listening about ignoring evidence?) Old habits die hard, the habit to put pleasing other people ahead of your own health or, if you don't please other people, to beat yourself up about it and feel three times as awful. 

So, no, there will be no "Mrs A" appearing this week at the classroom door. Naughty children can breathe sighs of relief, students who enjoy my sense of humor and listening ear will have to wait for a week from tomorrow for my reappearance. So brew another cup of revolting herbal tea, fluff up the pillow and set up the laptop for another episode of "Single Handed" an old Irish cop series that I have resurrected since only one episode of the new season of "Vera" has dropped.... Tolerant though R is, I doubt his offer of going down to Safeway for lunch fixings extends to a miniature of Jamesons Whiskey.

And I leave a few photos of San Xavier del Bac, the mission just outside of Tucson on the Tohono O'odham Nation land, which I visited on Tuesday with my guests. Oh and a rainbow as in "Somewhere over the...."