In one of his more profound moments, R Kelly unleashed the following phrases upon the hapless ears of millions -
"My mind is telling me NOOOOOO
But my body, my body is telling me YESSSSS
Baby, I don't want to hurt nobody, but there is something I must confess..."
Needless to say, his confession is far different than mine, and the subject matter that follows diverges wildly from his original topic, but here it is:
I'm sick.
I had to cancel a performance.
It sucked, but it happened.
Well into day 4 of my winter cold, I'm feeling much more like a human and much less like a useless blob of sniffles and sneezes. My eyes are clear, my ears are no longer popping every time I take a sip of tea, I don't sound like Tom Waits when I speak, and I can climb the two flights of stairs up to my apartment without getting dizzy. Progress. This was not the case when I awoke on Sunday morning.
I stood up, got dizzy, sat down. Emailed the higher-ups at the opera house, went back to sleep. Awoke an hour later when one of them called me and said they'd get a replacement. I don't remember much of this conversation. Went back to sleep. Awoke two hours later, took a combination of mucinex and sinupret and ibuprofen, repeated at regular intervals, went through an entire box of kleenex, drank enough tea to float a barge, and generally bemoaned my misery. My husband, sweet man that he is, bore it all with grace and large batches of soup. When I went to the doctor on Monday, I found myself back in that frame of mind I'd always had as a freelances - I must not be sick. I must NOT be sick. I have to get better. RIGHT NOW. And my doctor, in her oh-so-efficient minces-no-words fashion, said, "Irgendwann sagt der Körper nein." ("Eventually/sometimes the body says no.")
And that's really it. All those years of rushing to the ENT because I had to do a show or an audition or a concert. What did it earn me? A whole lot of fussing and fretting (and a rather impressive traveling medicine cabinet) didn't manage to stop me from getting sick when my body insisted it was going to happen. I could write at length about the cognitive dissonance of our business that says, "you should never sing sick," whilst also saying, "there are no second chances," but that's something everyone has to sort out for themselves. After a rather nasty reaction to prednisone last year, I resolved I would never put myself through that particular roller-coaster ride again. I wash my hands like a fiend, I eat healthy, and I get enough sleep, but sometimes we just get a bug. It happens. And no matter how much your mind screams that this is NOT happening, that you can power through this if you can just get enough of the right drugs on-board, your body is going to do as it damn well pleases.
Lo and behold, four days later, I can function. I'm not singing just yet - thanks, drippy nose/sore throat - but I'm able to go to staging rehearsals and get things done. I'll try singing again later this week, maybe even tomorrow, depending on how I feel. I thought I'd be much more downcast by canceling, but it wasn't my decision. My body simply said, "YES, I'M REALLY SICK. NO, YOU CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT." And there's no arguing.
And now, another spectacular pop music quote taken wildly out of context. A love song for my inner perfectionist-workaholic, delivered by the unmatchable Chaka Khan and Rufus.
"Got no time is what you're known to say.
I bet you wish there was 48 hours to each day.
The problem is you ain't been loved like you should.
What I got to give will sho nuff do you good."
Sometimes you don't need an emergency trip to the ENT. Sometimes you need to give yourself permission to be human - to get sick, and to allow your body to heal itself. And in all cases, you need Chaka Khan.
