Feverish Frustration

I was supposed to go to the zoo today. I was supposed to enjoy the day with my wife, my daughter and my sister-in-law. Instead, I spent it on the couch, under a blanket, with my temperature slightly elevated. Even more annoying is that I am positive that today's health woe is directly connected to pushing too hard yesterday. I have been doing a good job of balancing things for the past week, but I went too far yesterday.

Since the weekend juggling a house guest, school prep, housework and mental health has been flowing well. We have had a great time going places with my wife's sister. I continue to grow in respect for my teaching team and in excitement for the coming school year. My yoga and exercise have not fit, but I have been breathing and have remained calm. I even have managed to get big and little projects done in the house. Best of all, though, I have done all of this while still taking care of my physical health.

Unfortunately, I started on another big project yesterday. We are hoping to have some major work done on our house and garage. As a result of that, we needed to remove a decent sized tree (10 years old or so) from behind our garage. I thought it would fairly simple, but I was definitely wrong. I took one look at the tree and realized that I needed to get onto the roof to remove branches. While I was up there, my saw died, but I got the branches off.

I was exhausted and wisely went inside to rest and to have lunch. I had already had a four hour meeting that morning, and we were hosting a family cook out that night. I sat for an hour. Then, I made a horrid mistake. I assumed that I could quickly finish the tree. Since I had a second battery pack and only the trunk to cut down, I figured the cutting would go quickly. Invariably, the trunk was thicker than I thought, the wood was young and hard to cut, and the battery died quickly. I also became fixated on finishing. I pushed through because I was worried (irrationally) that I would leave the job unfinished. Fearing that weeks from now my wife and I would be fighting about the tree truck, I got the hatchet from our garage. I also know that my "estimations" can often be WAY off. I truly believed that I could chop the remaining tree down fast.

The actual process tool much longer - on the order of a half hour. I flailed away at the trunk. The blisters that developed on my right hand still hurt today. In fact the one that popped while I worked made me nervous at first. I thought it might be infected, but I was wrong (thankfully). I did get the tree down, but my whole body was shaking. Somehow, I settled down and had a good evening. My wife did most of the work when our guests arrived, but I even did some cooking and cleaning.

What drives me insane, though, is that I didn't sleep well. Then, I woke this morning and knew that I was sick again. I felt lousy, just like I did last week after trying to play ultimate. I understand that I need to be careful with my exercise and exertion, but it drives me nuts that one bad decision can derail me for at least a day. I am worried that it might even be more than one day. It took me three to four days to "recover" from ultimate. I also know I felt WAY worse yesterday than I did last Wednesday. I will cope with whatever tomorrow brings, but my mood will be dismal if I feel this sick or worse. We are supposed to go see the Star Wars exhibit at the Science Museum of Minnesota. I want to do that with my family, AND I REALLY want to see the exhibit. I just can't understand how my body can be this frail. It's crazy, absolutely crazy.