Sick and Tired

Chris Bell — Sick and Tired

Please welcome all the way from Brockton, my Chris Bell. Where are you, Chris? Where are you, Chris Bell? Chris Bell, is that you? No, yes, there you go. Yeah, here he comes. slouched at my kitchen table. It feels like I have an iron spike lodged in my forehead. This is the fifth day and I can’t seem to get rid of this sickness. I just want to crawl in bed and cancel my life for an entire month. But I know I can’t. So I take a bite of an everything bagel. And I can feel the crunchy seasoning on my tongue. But I can’t taste a thing. Even my morning coffee isn’t giving me the same kick. So I think I should just quit and keep that promise I made to my wife for years. But I know I can’t deal with caffeine withdrawals and when I’m already worn down. So not today. Today’s too important.

See, six months ago, I came up with a business idea. And my boss liked it so much that he wanted me to present it at the next big meeting. So for months, I’ve been working to perfect this presentation, and today is the day. If this goes well, it could mean a promotion, and that would be huge for both me and my family. So my plan is simple. Get to work early, review my notes, and mentally prepare to knock this presentation out of the park. Sickness or no sickness, I need to come with my A game. So I throw some Tylenol in my bag and I go to leave the front door and God picks this moment to remind me that I have children. My teenage daughter screams, dad, the washing machine is flooding the basement.

Turns out she took every piece of clothing we own and stuffed it into one wash. Apparently she wanted to get her chores done quicker. So as I’m feeling water penetrate the soles of my shoes, her little brother comes downstairs and tries to convince me that he wasn’t playing with my razor again, and the hairs on his right eyebrow just fell out on their own. So as I’m juggling my little hand grenades, I’m already an hour late for work. So I’m flying down the highway. I finally make it to my desk three minutes, three minutes before my meeting’s about to start. I’m sweating, my notes are everywhere. I go to log onto my computer so I can join the online meeting, and my screen greets me with incorrect password. I’m like, my password has always been the name of my first dog with a capital Y.

Or is it a lowercase I? So after what feels like forever, I’m finally able to reset my password and join the meeting. only to find out I now have five minutes to give a 20 minute presentation. So what happens next is a lot like watching me fall down a flight of stairs. I stumble, I stutter, I load the wrong slides. And when my presentation is over, I’m just faced with blank stares. I am so disappointed and mad at myself right now. I wanna flip my desk over and punch a hole in the wall, but I don’t. I take a deep breath and a personal day, and I go straight to the store to get the one thing that will make me feel better right now, chocolate ice cream.

So I’m at the grocery store and I pick up my ice cream, I go to checkout, and this lady with 623 items just narrowly cuts in front of me. And she saw me with my one item, and I know she did because she gave me a look like she still thinks it’s the 1950s and we shouldn’t be shopping in the same grocery store. So now I’m not only sick, I’m also angry. So somewhere, there’s video surveillance of me slamming my ice cream down on a magazine rack and stomping out the store, because I just need to get home. So I finally get home.

I’m lying on the couch. It’s dark. I have ice on my head. My wife finally arrives. She asked me what’s wrong. So I tell her, I don’t know. I have been sick all week. I can’t get rid of this headache. I’m messing up at work. I’m screaming at people at the grocery store. And it just feels like everything’s out of control right now. And I think I need to talk to someone. And her expression turns heavy. She sits down next to me and she says, babe, you know that coffee’s really not good for your high blood pressure, right? And I’m like, yeah, I know, I’m gonna quit, I promise. She’s like, no, no, just listen to me. I wanted to help. So last week, I secretly switched our coffee to decaffeinated.

So after I came back from Starbucks, I’m feeling 110% better. Three months later, I get another opportunity to present my idea. And this time I wrote my password down on my hand. But more importantly, I’m no longer drinking coffee. While my wife’s heart was in the right place, her plan to have me go cold turkey was just a horrible, horrible idea. But it did help me see how addicted I was to caffeine. And that was the motivation I needed to quit and keep the promise I made to my wife. But between you and me, every once in a while my wife will give me this little smile and it makes me wonder if that was her plan all along.

Thank you. It’s Chris Bell.