Cheese and Choux

I am a generally healthy person who sometimes daydreams about being sick. 

It's one of those things that I don't normally share, but this is what blogs do, right?  They lull you into a false sense of security until the ever-elusive over-share finally asserts itself.  So there you go.  Sometimes, even on the sunniest and most dappled days, I'd rather be in bed.  As a disclaimer, this feeling is usually dredged up when I've signed on for too much.  Over booked weekends.  Too much work.  Lack of lazy contact with good friends.  Lack of time with my characteristically un-lazy husband.  As someone who has never been one to nap (or at least, never figured out how to do it well), this is right about the time that I'm ready to sign out.  Curl up.  Assume the fetal position.  Shut the blinds, and shut out the world.  Retreat.  But then, what's that old adage?  Ah yes, that's it.

Be careful what you wish for.

Indeed, be careful what you wish for, because sometimes wishes pounce with snarled teeth.  And suddenly, it's the middle of picture-poignant May and I'm sick.  See, most of what I really wanted in those daydreams revolved around a decent break and a soft pillow.  I often forget that being sick, being the sick that involves doctors and antibiotics, is just plain rotten.  It's right up there with mud puddles and the stench of dirty diapers.  It has little to no redeeming qualities, and retains the sobering quality of rendering its victim both unproductive and slug-like.  (I do know that I could write sluggish here, but really, it's too pretty a word).

So, as you might have guessed from the rambling diatribe, I was out for the count for a little over a week.  In the week following my bout with bronchitis, I loped around our home with little energy.  And if my eyes ever glowed, it was only because my fever had come back unannounced.  It occurred to me - when I was too tired to read the stack of magazines positioned neatly by my pillow - that I often wish for breaks, because I don't often take them.  And I don't often take them, because I'm not good at being so still.  I know what you're thinking: startling, Sherlock, just startling.  Even so, it's been a real lesson for me as I ease my way back into my previous pace.  It's been my own cautionary tale.  I have to go easier on myself.  At the very least, I can't give the universe an excuse to knock me out again.

That being said, I found my own ways to be one badass invalid.  I ate Popsicles with no thought to portion control.  When I tired of Vogue, I lingered over Simone de Beauvoir's slightly depressive She Came To Stay with its group of morose characters; I had to embrace my people.  And when I really wanted to throw caution to the wind, I limped outside to sit on the porch for 10 minutes.  Without sunglasses.  The splintering headache the followed only served to augment my very satisfied feeling of rebellion.  But my greatest coup d'etat came from the mother of all counter-culture leaders: Oprah.  I know what you're thinking.  You're thinking that Oprah's pretty tame, but you weren't there for one Monday's sandwich spectacular.  Oprah sent her best friend, Gayle (don't pretend you don't know her name), on some kind of cross-country tasting mission to find the best sandwiches in America.  Instantly, I was salivating - and this from someone who had lost all ability to taste!  A number of sandwiches had me sitting on my elbows amidst my pyramid of pillows.  But there was one sandwich that, according to Gayle at least (whom I now really want to be friends with too), left the others in its dust.  Or crumbs, as the case may be.

This sandwich was a grilled cheese constructed by the Cafe Muse out of Michigan.  Now, I love a rockin' sandwich, particularly when it's coupled with soup.  Still, I hadn't thought to do anything with grilled cheese.  I'm not sure why the thought had never crossed my mind, because grilled cheese has all the elements to satisfy: undeniable nostalgia, simplicity, gooey constructs, bread.  What's not to love?  But THIS grilled cheese mixed in different types of cheeses and honey.  In the words of Renee Zellweger (who will never cease to be the chick from Empire Records for me), it had me at hello. 

On Monday night, and then AGAIN on Tuesday night, I ate the very worst kind of food for a sick person.  I succumbed to temptation and had my grilled cheese.  It involved heirloom tomatoes and toasted bread.  It was the most gooey its ever been.  Jordan and I couldn't even talk, because our mouths acted as vessels to catch fallen cheese.  (Now, I had lost my voice by this point, but that's really besides the point).  While I dutifully ate sick person food for the rest of the week, namely broth and more broth, I treasured my act of rebellion.  And in throes of a cloudy illness that resembled nothing like the stuff of my daydreams, I even believe that I could taste it.

I don't need to post this recipe.  I'll just send you to it by way of O herself.