THE FEAR

I’m less than a week from going to Hawaii and a phobia of mine has popped up again. I always fear getting sick right before I travel. If that were to happen, it’d suck for two reasons. First, getting on an airplane when you’re ill is terrible. Flying in the 21st century is not a pleasant experience even when you’re completely healthy but imagine being cooped up in small confined metal tube for several hours while you’re packed in with the other cattle in economy. Second, once you get to your vacation spot, you’ll be too tired and out of it to enjoy the trip.

I came this close to having this nightmare realized last February when I went to San Diego. I chronicled it a previous post but the summary is I caught the flu about 48 hours before my flight. Like it wasn’t just a sore throat and some nasal congestion. I had a massive headache, my entire body was in pain, and I switched between being freezing cold and sweaty hot. By some miracle, some 24 hours after I fell ill, my symptoms subsided almost completely in the course of about an hour. I’m still not sure if it was my immune system or the Tamiflu that I had prescribed. I was fine to fly and felt just about normal on the plane. I didn’t get away scot-free however. On a few nights of my trip, I felt quite tired by around 10pm and basically had to go to sleep.

Now that I’m on the eve of another trip, I’m actually considering limiting my exposure to the public until I go to the airport. I know this sounds ridiculous but I don’t currently have a job to go so outside of perhaps getting food and supplies, do I really need to be out and about risking my chances of touching some pole, door handle, or other surface that might have some disease on it? I’m just imagining myself stuck in bed all day in my hotel room when just outside is the sun, water, and beaches of Hawaii.

Man, I think I’m gonna just call Pizza Hut delivery until Sunday night.