Allergies

It wasn’t that I didn’t know it was going to be warm and breezy. I knew it was going to get over 85F here in the Pedro, but I needed to be outdoors and moving. Besides it’s rare that I get bad allergies like my mom whose sneeze could crush eardrums — if I get hard of hearing in my later life, I will not blame the My Bloody Valentine concert I went to in 2008; that I will bestow solely on my mother.

After the first hill, on came the sneezes one after the other like a jackhammer punctuating the silence. By the time I came back home the nose water was flowing. By the evening the sinuses were pulsating in protest. And all around my desk were wads of used tissue that I set down hoping to use every available square inch before disposing. Jeez, I have become my mother.

Today they’re not as severe. I still have some nose water. I still feel the itch deep in my right nostril that I’m convinced is the source of all my troubles. But it will pass. At least I don’t have the flu.