I visited the doctor a second time last Tuesday.  He had looked at the X-ray of my lungs.  Nothing appeared to be wrong with them.  This means that the original diagnosis of pleurisy still holds.  I do not have pneumonia or bronchitis or some other nasty lung ailment.  Nope.  I’ve got the weird disease that nobody’s heard of.  The doctor said to continue my 10 day prescription of anti-inflammatories, after which, I should be able to slowly resume normal activities.

I attempted to resume normal activities two days later — the very last day of my medication.  I did some light stretching and sit-ups in the gym.  I went again over the weekend, pushing myself no harder.  I did absolutely no jogging or biking.  And yet, here I am – five weeks into the onset of this ailment — and it is still not going away.

There is not much to be said about that without lapsing into whining self pity.  I must remark nevertheless on the incredible link between mind and body…  If my body were healthy right now, I would feel like a million bucks.  I have numerous reasons to be optistic; school work proceeds at pace but with some success, my manuscript will be out the door by the weekend, and my girlfriend arrives Saturday.

But in all this, I am frequently beset with feelings of complete despair.  I can’t figure out why, a year after quitting smoking, after a year of taking better care of myself than ever before, that suddenly I become sicker for longer than ever in my entire life. 

Is this irony?

Whatever it is, it feels totally unjust.

Because it will cheer me up, I am going to think of plucky Captain Mylander, the hero of a new story I am working on.  Because this is a photoroman adventure, we can actually see Captain Mylander in the flesh… or rather, in the plastic:

Walking in Montreal