BrianJBecker.com

It has been a busy time. I’ve got more tasks than time and I was home from work sick one day this week. It’s rare for me to stay home even when I don’t feel well.  The big tasks, loan fund growth projections, human resources, etc, etc, may not be critical every day.  But the minor daily reasons for me to be around the office include: opening and closing the safe, signing checks and documents, making lots of little and medium-sized decisions, and generally managing the show.  I felt funny on Monday and I didn’t know why. I told the staff in our management meeting that I was feeling off and I was grumpy, in other words: feel free to steer a bit clear of me today. Then Monday night I was up half the night with some significant stomach ailment. I’d have gone to work in the morning but I felt so weak in the morning, I was worried getting back up the 130 stairs in the evening would be misery. Plus, we have an energetic intern here for a couple of months and he wasn’t sick. I gave him the keys and he skipped out the door. Various staff members brought by papers for me to sign sitting on my sofa in my pajamas and my sour sick-face.

I watched a French comedy film and finished reading two books and gradually regained strength. I’ve been sick twice now in a few months and the funny part is that there are illnesses here that feel completely different from the ones I am used to in the USA. There was the one recently that made one side of my neck swell up and my joints hurt for three days and I doubt I’ll ever know what that was. But the best part of any flavor of illness is the getting better. It’s like coming out of a tunnel into the sunshine again. When I am sick I can’t help but think about the people who are sick and without much hope for getting better. Just like the pain of hunger is more bearable with the knowledge that food is stocked in the cupboard, brief illness is very tolerable with the promise of rapid recovery. May God’s peace be with all of us, and especially those who are not so fortunate. I believe there are things we must learn from them.