I woke in the middle of the night with a pillow jammed over my face and someone leaning on it. I could barely breathe.
Thinking it was a professional hit arranged by my wife or editor, I stopped fighting and waited for the gunshot. I waxed philosophical in my helplessness. Maybe it was time. Over six decades of life is more than some people get.
Abruptly I sneezed and got brain lubricant all over the new and expensive bedspread my wife had just put on the bed. Now I wanted to die. I had identified my assailant — Allergic Rhinitis.
My wife, still half asleep, muttered, “What was that?” I lied. I told her it was probably a burglar, and that I would go shoot him. Long accustomed to my nonsense, she went back to sleep.
That was close. Had I told her what really happened to the new bedspread, there would have been a death.
I slipped out of bed. Because of our recent move, I had to sort through piles of unpacked boxes in the dark looking for the one labeled “flashlights” so I could find the one labeled “My [flipping] allergy [stuff].”
When I found it, I popped a couple of meds and snorted half a bottle of oxymetazoline HCI before returning to bed and scratching my face until everything kicked in.
Of all the physical burdens in my life (many of my own doing), allergies are among the top five. It’s right there with surgical pins, vision impairment, mental health issues and being friends with Sonny.
My allergies are not constant. I get a few sniffles in the spring, but the itch and snot monster doesn’t really show itself until autumn. Then I become the walking dead.
Red eyes, swollen face, ragged breath and a raw, dripping nose do not invite close familiarity. Family and friends avoid me. Small children burst into tears. Dogs pee and flee.
Years ago, I may have killed an elderly woman. She turned a corner in a department store and we came face-to-raw-face. She gasped in fright. I barely had time to cover my face before I sneezed. Her eyes rolled back and she fell flat. I fled.
For weeks I avoided the news. I told no one. Selfish, I know. But I was not going to prison because of ragweed, tumbleweed, pigweed or any of the other weeds that transform me and my kind into something monstrous every fall.
I don’t know anyone who is allergy free, but I know a lot of people for whom it is not a big deal. A pill and a box of tissues gets them through. I also know people who not only take prescription allergy medications but also drink heavily for weeks leading up to the first frost. I used to be one of them.
Thanks to modern medicine, my annual attacks of whatever weed is currently pollinating can be sufficiently managed to enable me to work. I’m grateful for that, but I worry about the side effects. I’d prefer something more natural.
Maybe it’s time Sonny and I took another trip to Colorado. Maybe there’s an herbal remedy that — wait a minute.
Medical marijuana is a weed. And it’s autumn. You don’t think that — no. No way. Life couldn’t possibly be that cruel.