The Mexican Influenza

Because I am an American without any medical coverage my health plan
is to seek a cool, dry place and lick my wounds, do a dance of healing
with dynamic uncertainty, until I am healed - or dead.

So naturally I don't have any medical confirmation of my condition.
And yet, I returned to these United States from Mexico with general
respiratory distress, and a slight fever.

This winter has been an arduous time for my respiratory system. I have
worked and lived in dust-laden environments. In Oklahoma and Mexico
people smoke tobacco with total abandon. I've done a lot of
second-hand tobacco smoking. At first I thought that my respiratory
problems were the result of this.

I have been waking in the middle of the night struggling to breathe,
drowning in the fluids in my lungs. This then becomes the struggle to
control the panic and then to control the breath.

It has been a mild case, as they say. The worse, for me, is over. My
lungs are clearing. It is a relief to know what the problem is, that
my immune system is up to the challenge, that I am too old to be among
the most vulnerable.

Again Fortuna has been with me.

And yet I have a feeling that this influenza will reap a rich harvest
of death, that this is a further increment in the
realization/constellation of the self-fulfilling prophecies of the
Archetype of Apocalypse (see www.libbyhome.blogspot.com 'the narrative
of the voyage of the bloody, snake chariot').

I am writing this to give warning to the people I have been in contact
with the last couple of weeks - especially those between the ages of
25 to 45 (which is the ages of the reported fatal cases in Mexico). If
you run into any respiratory problems - take it seriously. This is a
time for even proud Americans without medical coverage to quickly
utilize hospital emergency rooms.

A vaccine is at least several long months away. In the meantime the
anti-virus medications that are said to be stockpiled all over the
country/world are said to be effective against the influenza - at
least for now.

Be not anxious.

But be Conscious.

This is not a drill.