Affliction
noun
| 1. | a condition of great distress, pain, or suffering |
| 2. | something responsible for physical or mental suffering, such as a disease, grief, etc
They’re here. We’ve been back from Feb break for about 2 weeks now together. And what does that mean? The germs, viruses and bacteria we brought back from tropical vacations or hometowns have made their fullest circulation across campus. You hear it in class, as your professor is about to say the most important point of the lecture: COUGH. And you miss it. Great. But you can’t lean to your left because the girl to your left is sniffling and nursing a batch of tissues and the kid to your right clearly isn’t taking notes. When the choruses of coughs and symphonies of sniffles seem to ring through lecture halls you know we’re in the heart of winter. I admit I am a victim, or perhaps even one of the coughing assailants. But one thing is for sure, displacement is sure to exist simultaneously with illness. Your sense of self seems to drown in a fit of unrest ( and mucous), and you watch the others going around you as if immortal. And there you are powerless, and stuck in slow-motion while the rest of the world operates at hyper-speed. There is nothing I dislike more than being ill honestly. Sure its kind of amazing how your symptoms are your body’s natural way of fighting, but you cant help but be spiteful as your grab another tissue feebly, or take another shot of cough medicine. The doctor says “ rest up, you’ll feel better soon”, but honestly, who has the time? |
But then again, as Valentine’s Day recently passed, and as I take a class titled “Love Stories”, perhaps what I’m describing is a different type of affliction. All of those age old poets from the Middle Ages allude to love as an illness, or an affliction. So what do we say about our beloved 2/14..a day where people are overcome with illness? Stuck by cupid’s arrow ( the pain) equals a trip to Hallmark to find the cure for the affliction? In Shakespeare’s Sonnet 147 he writes “ My love is as a fever, longing still/ For that which longer nurseth the disease/ Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill/ he uncertain sickly appetite to please.” Well you won’t find that in Hallmark, because people don’t talk that way anymore, or even think it.
Regardless of sickness or not, I’d like to think of Valentine’s day as a chance for everyone ( not just couples) to celebrate their “afflictions” whether that be romantic or not. A chance for love to exist in the world a little more than normal may not be harmful after all.