XplanaZine

Transcript

Getting sick just isn’t as much fun as it used to be.

You see, I have all of these great memories about being sick when I was a kid. I remember my mother making chicken noodle soup for me and serving it to me in bed. I remember watching cartoons and daytime soap operas. I remember sleeping all I wanted and not having to do homework. Back in the day, getting sick seemed like such a fun thing to do.

Well, I was out sick the last two weeks and I just couldn’t seem to recreate all of those fun memories. My family was really nice to me but I never did get enough sleep, and the cartoons and daytime soaps just didn’t hold my attention. And food. Forget about it. I spent the entire week wishing I could just taste anything at all.

Yep, getting sick isn’t as much fun as I remembered and it’s certainly not something I recommend.

But it did get me thinking about some of the real benefits of the online lifestyle when it comes to being down on your health. Whether you are a teacher or a student, the following are definite improvements when it comes to being sick.

1. Keeping people up-to-date on your health. There you are, feeling bad, and you need to let folks know that you’ll get back to them but not with your usual promptness. Just send an e-mail. You need an extension on a deadline and can get one with some proactive communication. Send an e-mail. When you’re sick, e-mail is an effective way to feel somewhat connected to the outside world, but in a manner that you can control with relative ease.
2. Keeping track of what you’ve missed out on. I remember being sick as a kid and showing up to school with that feeling of dread regarding all the work I had missed. Even though I was feeling fine by then, I suspected the first few afternoons wouldn’t be spent playing with my friends but rather doing missed homework. Sometimes that was the case, and other times it turned out there wasn’t really any missed work to catch up on. The great thing about being connected in today’s world is that you can passively track what’s going on in your world even while you’re out of commission. It helps you measure your anxiety properly and, generally, relax because you really do know what’s going on.
3. Taking advantage of moments when you’re feeling better. One of the things I noticed about being sick is that there are times when you feel okay for short spurts. Maybe it’s only thirty minutes, but you find yourself saying, “Wow, I’m feeling better! Maybe I can get something done before I fall apart again.” Okay, most likely it’s the drugs talking but the feeling is still there. Again, e-mail can prove useful here. In thirty minutes you can catch up on some short communication requests, take care of some nagging busywork (heck, you’re feeling bad anyway so you might as well do stuff you don’t like), or even complete a short task. In the past, everything just piled up and you spent those few good moments worrying about all the things that weren’t getting done. Now you can do something about those things and be ever-more-ready to get back into the game.

Now, the downside of all this connectivity is that you really are in the know and you may find it hard to get away from everything completely. Well, don’t fret it. In the end, leaving it all behind when you’re sick is still as easy as it was when I was a kid. Remember, you’re sick! It’s the one time in your life that people will actually let you get away with not taking part in things. Take advantage of the situation.

As soon as you get back in the swing, no one’s going to feel sorry for you anymore. Trust me.

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