constellations #44: recovery reads
Hi again.
Last week I got my second dose of Moderna, and my nervous anticipation of its side effects threw me for a mental loop. The night after my first shot I had been almost too freaked out about the potential pain to sleep; I felt fine the next day. But they say the second shot is worse, and I had already watched Matt go through his aftermath: in bed all day feeling weak and achy with a fever whose intensity shocked me; unable to do really anything but sleep and groan. Plus, I’m a wimp about this kind of stuff.
Writer Haley Nahman described exactly this phenomenon in her newsletter, Maybe Baby, over the weekend. “It’s strange to know you are about to feel terrible,” she says. “Few painful experiences in life warn you that they’re coming. You might suspect they’re coming, or work tirelessly to prevent them from coming, but rarely do you know for sure that they are, and when.” (The whole thing is worth a read — a lovely meditation on pain, comfort, bodies, and presence.)
From the sounds of it, Haley had it rougher than I did; my side effects didn’t come on quite as strong as I feared or last too long. But here are some things that aided in my recovery and/or distracted me from worrying about feeling sick and/or actually feeling sick:
Finally reading a handful of tabs I’d had open for a long time: Sophie Haigney in Drift on the history of citations and googling an author while you’re reading their book; Claire McNear in The Ringer about the guest-host rotation on Jeopardy!; Ada Limón in LitHub about bodies and pain and preparing to re-enter the world.
Listening to podcasts starring my friends, which makes me feel extremely cool and proud: this episode of Popcast, in which my friend Mina talks about the musician Beverly Glenn-Copeland; The Last Archive, which my friend Ben helps make.
Reading the entire plot of movies I haven’t seen or don’t remember on Wikipedia, including City Of Angels (1998) starring Nicholas Cage (because I remembered watching it with my mom when I was home sick from school as a teen) and White House Down (2013) starring Channing Tatum (because it came on TV after something my mom and I were watching the other day, so we watched the first few minutes of it, and then I simply had to know what happened).
Reading book Untamed by Glennon Doyle, which wasn’t a book I was planning to read, but my sister asked me to, and I live by a creed that “please read this book, it changed my life” is a precious command to which I shall never say no. Anyway a big message of that book is that discomfort can be productive and useful so it was a natural fit for my post-vaccine mindset. (Also reading: A Little Devil in America by Hanif Abdurraqib, which I recommend.)
Watching this video of Tank and the Bangas performing the song “Quick” (and then, later in the same show, this video of Quinn Christopherson playing his song “Simple,” which makes me cry).
Listening to “Ambrosia” by Rosie Tucker; “Strawberry” by Doss; “Because The Night” by Patti Smith
Okay that’s all for now. Hope you are healthy and well and recovering from, you know, all of it.
xo,
M