I have COVID. After two years of running, it got me. I feel thankful that I (hopefully) have the abridged version, thanks in no small part to the various jabs I got to prepare me for this very moment. Still, I have to say that I've experienced some weird symptoms that I wasn't expecting. One, specifically has left me puzzled.
The tears.
Today, randomly out of nowhere, I started to cry. I was in the car driving to the get a PCR test to confirm my rapid test diagnosis from the other day. It was stunningly glorious outside for a March day (well, the 31st, but still). I was filled with gratitude for being alive to witness the miracle of yet another spring. I know it's going to come every year, and every year my breath is taken away by the sheer glory of it when it arrives. Still, I don't normally cry about it. I don't know if it was the Covid or what, but the tears flowed like a waterfall over this 16 degree day outside. Drivers around me must have thought I was mourning a loved one or listening to a depressing podcast, but no - I was marvelling at the fact that I heard a cardinal when I was at a red light and the air smelled like fresh soil.
If that had been the only occasion of crying today, I would have probably forgotten that it happened. But it kept happening, over and over throughout the day in response to various uneventful occurrences. It just happened again a minute ago after my 35th lifetime viewing of Clueless (I haven't actually counted, and I debated even mentioning it here, but DAMN that is STILL a good movie).
Happily - and curiously - the tears have not been tears of sadness today at any point. Despite this being my third day in isolation in my bedroom, eating soup balanced on my lap, googling whether it's normal to feel like my head is about to float off of my body, and my chest and sinuses to feel jammed to capacity with solid matter, my crying has only ever overtaken me today in moments of gratitude or joy.
It's a symptom of COVID that I was unprepared for...but I'll take it.
