Discourse Blog

Discourse Blog

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
Welcome to the Summer of Sick
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
User's avatar
Discover more from Discourse Blog
A daily politics, media criticism, and culture newsletter from the left. Worker-owned, subscriber-supported, and free from corporate influence. Est. 2020.
Over 22,000 subscribers
Already have an account? Sign in

Welcome to the Summer of Sick

I rejoined the world and immediately got a horrible cold. Welcome back!

Jack Crosbie's avatar
Jack Crosbie
May 07, 2021

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
Welcome to the Summer of Sick
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
Share
Flickr/Phyllis Buchanan

Last Sunday I woke up with a horrible sore throat. I thought I was just hung over and dried out, as I'd spent some time at a bar next to a friend who was smoking for the first time in months the previous night, but by 5 or 6 p.m. I realized that whatever was wrong with my body was not solely connected to the mixture of clamato juice and Corona (the beer, not the virus) I had agreed to consume at 1 a.m. Instead, I was sick.

Like many people I know, I have not been sick in well over a year. I was fortunate enough to not catch the deadly disease rampaging the country and in doing so managed to not catch any other disease for about a year. But now things are opening back up, I am vaccinated against the Big One, and we are going back out in the world. It's going to be a hot vaxx summer. We're going to have so much fun. Unfortunately we are also going to get sick all the time.

When I realized I was sick I was mostly just offended. It seems profoundly unfair to have survived a global pandemic only to lose a week of your newly reclaimed life to a simple cold. Before this, of course, was the panic that maybe I was about to be another entry into the very, very short list of breakthrough COVID infections. Every cough had me convinced that this was it, that despite two shots of Pfizer I had finally contracted the disease.

I went and got a test, dreading the list of text messages that I'd have to send if it came back positive. I had outdoor drinks with two sets of friends last weekend, played in a rec league softball game, had another friend over inside our apartment. Almost everyone involved in this was fully vaxxed, as was I, but still -- the fear is there.

In January, there was a wave of articles about how, thanks to widespread social distancing and mask-use, the flu season had almost disappeared. I'm hopeful that perhaps with even a modicum of post-pandemic mask-wearing, we can lessen the annual burden of fall and winter sickfests in the future, but I think we're also discounting that many of us have not been sick at all in the past year. And oh boy, we're about to be.

I don't say this to spoil anyone's summer. I had forgotten what it was like but getting a cold is fine. It sucks, but it's fine. It's more inconvenient now because you need to go get a COVID test to make sure you're not going to kill anyone with it and you have to stop being as careless with your mask as you were merely days before, but it's going to be ok. Stock up on DayQuil and ibuprofen, download a new video game you've been meaning to play, and prepare your partner for the ordeal of having to deal with you whining about having the sniffles for 3-5 days and then succumbing to the same bug just as you're getting better. You'll be back out there in no time.


Subscribe to Discourse Blog

Thousands of paid subscribers
A daily politics, media criticism, and culture newsletter from the left. Worker-owned, subscriber-supported, and free from corporate influence. Est. 2020.

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
Welcome to the Summer of Sick
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
Share

Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Bari Weiss Is Full of Shit
Her big trans panic story turned out to be nonsense, just like everything else she does.
Mar 2, 2023 â€¢ 
Katherine Krueger
304

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
Bari Weiss Is Full of Shit
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
5
CNN's Disgraceful Propaganda
This segment from Dana Bash on the Palestine protest movement is one of the most shameful things I have ever seen on cable news.
May 2, 2024 â€¢ 
Jack Mirkinson
136

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
CNN's Disgraceful Propaganda
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
55
No Hell Is Hot Enough for Joe Biden
I hope he’s faced with the horror he’s wrought when judgment comes to meet him.
Jan 17 â€¢ 
Katherine Krueger
84

Share this post

Discourse Blog
Discourse Blog
No Hell Is Hot Enough for Joe Biden
Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More
4

Ready for more?

© 2025 Discourse Blog Inc.
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start writingGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture

Share

Copy link
Facebook
Email
Notes
More

Create your profile

User's avatar

Only paid subscribers can comment on this post

Already a paid subscriber? Sign in

Check your email

For your security, we need to re-authenticate you.

Click the link we sent to , or click here to sign in.