A few days ago I went to the clinic for a throat culture. The nurse came back to me with a serious face. "I’m afraid it’s strep throat," she said. Why was she so puzzled when I reacted with glee? Surely she’s seen this before? Surely she knows that You have strep throat means We have penicillin for that?
Even though the penicillin made the really painful, red, sore throat go away, it seems that in the last few days of shouting to make myself heard over the children I had irritated my throat some, and it still hurt (in a raspy, mechanical sort of way) to talk. So on my way to the restaurant where I sometimes eat breakfast on Saturday mornings before anyone else in the family gets up, I decided not to talk for a whole day. I knew that if I talked even a little, eventually I’d be shouting, reading books to the kids, and otherwise overdoing it. It would have to be all or nothing.
When I got to the restaurant I wrote on a pad of paper I brought from the car: I lost my voice – can’t talk today 😦 . Bistec criollo, 3 eggs over easy, no toast, grapefruit juice, coffee. The waitress, who has waited on me many times before, was kindly sympathetic — but she reacted as if I had also become deaf! Pointing at my coffee and miming filling it up, for instance. Very funny.
I got home before anyone had gotten up. My 7yo was the first to come downstairs. I wrote, My throat is sore. It hurts to talk. I am going to rest my voice. Please help me talk to the little ones because they can’t read. I will probably have to talk to them some but I am going to try not to talk to you and Dad. He felt important!
It was strangely peaceful not to talk. I did school planning, and some household chores. I let my husband shout at the kids. I managed to teach the 7yo how to fold a fitted sheet without speaking or writing, a feat for which I probably deserve national recognition. Milo kept coming up to me and screaming "TALK!" in my ear. I smiled, mimed zipping my lips, and pointed at Mark. Several hundred times maybe.
I broke my silence around dinner time, still a little raspy but not as pain-wracked. It was on the whole a pleasant day. Maybe I’ll try it again sometime.
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