Mommy, come back 'cause the water's all gone.

I'm lying on the ceiling, on what feels like a mattress. It's oddly comfortable. Some kind of reverse gravity is pulling me deeper and deeper up into the cushiony softness.

 I open my eyes to find that I'm actually in bed. Funny how your mind can trick you, especially when you're as sick as I am. My throat is so swollen and sore that I can't swallow. My pillow is wet from saliva. My entire body aches, and I'm shivering uncontrollably despite the 104 fever burning inside. I am the definition of wretched.

I close my eyes, and I'm on the ceiling again. I'm not crazy about being up here, but I can barely keep my eyes open, so I guess I don't have much choice.

I'm actually not sure how long I've been like this. I keep waking up and passing out again, and the shadows in the room change each time I open my eyes.  Days... weeks... months... years?

I'm vaguely aware of being alive, so it can't have been longer than a couple of days. I don't remember the last time I got up to pee or had a drink of water. I wish my mom was here. Sick and alone is a bad combination. What if I die? How long will it take for someone to find me? Will my cat eat my face? Where is my phone? All very important questions. Delirious or not, I need to take action.

My eyelids feel like they're being pressed down by mean, rough phantom hands. I glide my arms over the bed, feeling around for my phone to call my mom. She doesn't even live in the same city as me, but she needs to know I'm probably not going to make it.  This flu has "RIP Shelley Z" written all over it. H1RIPSZ. Wasn't it in the news? Regardless, my mom will save me. She'll know what to do. The soothing hand that turned me round, a love so real swept over me.

What's that thing in my hand? It feels like a phone. I push the on button and pry my eyes open just enough to scan my contacts for my mother's number. Tap. Hello? I hear her voice on the other end, but I can't understand what she's saying, like she's speaking another language. I pause for a moment and try to put the sounds together in my head.

I think she's asked me if I've had any water to drink in the last eight hours. Hmm, I'm going to have to think very hard about this. Finally, I request clarification: "Mommy, what's eight hours?"

Things start to go dark. The phone slips out of my hand and suddenly I'm listening to another voice. A man's voice. He's describing the child-rearing habits of a creature known as the glass spider. David Attenborough, is that you? Thank God. Will you please bring me some water?

Sweet mother of Jesus, what the fuck was that? Sick dreams are so messed up. Coming to, I feel like I'm floating in a putrid sea of my own perspiration. Has my fever finally broken? I try to swallow some saliva, but to no avail. My bed is disgusting, and I simply cannot continue to lay here in this gross sweat pool. But I don't have the energy to change the sheets. Somehow, I need to get myself over to the couch. I sit up, but I'm too dizzy, and I crash back down onto the bed.

My kidneys ache. Dehydration. I force myself to swallow. Red hot razors slice my throat as they work their way down the narrow passage. Tears break from my eyes. God fucking damn that hurts. But you know what? I'm over this. This is not how I die. Holding onto the dresser for support, I pull myself over the edge of the bed and onto my feet. Hugging the wall, I shuffle to the kitchen, my head banging like it's being hammered by a thousand mallets. I pour a glass of tap water and brace myself against the pain of swallowing it.

Within seconds, intense nausea gives way to relief, and bit of strength returns. I make my way to the couch. It's nice to be awake for a change. Maybe now that my fever has broken, I'll start feeling better. I decide to open my laptop and check in with the world and see what's new.

Good news is hard to find. Ebola is rampaging its way through Africa and threatening to emigrate. Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 passengers are returning to their homes in body bags. Israel's bombing the Gaza Strip. The mayor of my city is an admitted crack addict who has astonishingly managed to retain voter support of 30%, and my preferred candidate is losing support. America still thinks it can change the Middle East. And Kim Kardashian did something that doesn't matter. If it wasn't for her, you'd think it was still 1987.

I've been online for only a few minutes, but my eyes are already getting heavy again, and the dreaded full-body fatigue is kicking back in. What's more, my fever seems to be returning. I close my laptop and prostrate myself on the couch to rest.

The sick dreams begin again, one after another. It begins with the plight of a homeless woman who is trying to find money to feed herself and her child.It turns out, her child has been exposed to radiation and is tragically suffering from debilitation deformities.

The child's mother has turned to the streets to make her living, and she winds up in a relationship with a hopeless heroin addict. He promises to kick the stuff and turn their lives around. They promise each other that this will be their last trip before they begin their new lives. Her child plays with a discarded needle in the next room.

4:05ish - Bowie on roller skates playing a guitar solo.

1:30ish - David Bowie gets beat up by mean dancers.

I wake from these dreams with my fever raging anew and nausea so intense that I'm unable to make it to the bathroom before the water I've drunk projects violently from my mouth to the floor. Nowhere in the world is as comfortable as this patch of hardwood beneath my hands and knees, so I slide down to my belly and close my eyes again.

And I'm out. I descend into another bizarre sick dream. I'm happily walking around the streets of downtown Manhattan. The sky is blue, the day is warm, and everything is technicolour happy. And then I realize I'm naked. Embarrassed, I duck into a clothing store to try to find something to wear, but I can't seem to get the clothes on my body. I put on a shirt, only to get lost inside it, unable to find the sleeves or the collar. 

Throwing the shirt to the floor in frustration, I attempt to slide my legs into some pants, but I keep missing the pant legs. Trying to get into these pants, I'm stumbling around the shop like I'm doing some kind of ridiculous dance. The shopgirl says she likes the beat of my drum.

Suddenly I find myself standing on a gigantic pedestal in the middle of the Hudson River. Gigantic, naked, and looming, I feel a hand caress my back. Suddenly the hand, big and turquoise, slides around to my breast. I turn around to see Lady Liberty herself leaning in for a kiss. She kisses well, for a statue, and I'm rather enjoying this. But wait... what's she doing... no! Dear God, not the torch!

 I look out into the harbour to see a water taxi crammed with tourists watching me get torched by Lady Liberty, each one with their phone in the air, instagramming this monumental sight for posterity. I can even hear the tour guide describing our every move, the majestic gift from France and her Canadian companion, giving New York an eye-full. 

The sun sets behind us and the tourists begin to scream wildly as the tour guide announces that the band they have all come to see is about to hit the stage. The pedestal grows in size and suddenly I find myself at the microphone with Lady Liberty next to me, wailing away on the guitar. Behind me, I can barely make out the other members of my band, they're faceless and blurry, but we all perform together in perfect unison a rock 'n' roll song for the people on the ferry. Tonight the Zeroes were singing for you. Maybe this dream isn't so bad after all. I look down... yep, still naked.

I wake up screaming as I'm suddenly immersed in ice cold water. I'm in my bathroom, in the tub, my pyjamas clinging to me wetly. I glance around the room, trying to find the culprit. Then I see her. My mom. I knew she'd come to save me.

*****

This flu story  is based on true events. Once, when I was living alone, I got so sick that I was basically bed-bound for five days with a fever that kept breaking and then coming back, and glands so swollen that I couldn't swallow my own spit.

Eventually, my boyfriend-at-the-time came over to find out why I had vanished from existence, and we had a conversation in which I actually remember my own delirium and complete inability to comprehend his words. I actually did respond to his question of "have you had any water in the last eight hours?" with a confused reply of "what's eight hours?". He took me to the hospital, and I remember telling him to watch out for the pine trees crossing the road. At the hospital, I told the nurse not to worry because there were plenty of nachos to go around.

It's scary to be that sick and to be alone, unable to take basic care of yourself.

Anyway, I sort of feel the need to apologize for this post. Not my best work, I admit. Incoherent mess, is more like it. I can't say exactly why "sick in bed with the flu" is where this album took me.  Never Let Me Down didn't exactly imbue me with the kind of inspiration that usually happens when I'm listening to a Bowie album.

After doing my standard research at the beginning of the listening period and finding out that Never Let Me Down is universally considered Bowie's worst album (including by him), I dove in with pretty low expectations. Sadly, my expectations were met. Having said that, I didn't totally hate everything about it. I'm not going to criticize someone who improved the world by pretty much consistently making awesome and innovative music over the course of 50 years with only a few exceptions. My creative contributions to the world are amoebic in comparison.

Most of this album won't make it into my playlist. I found the socially conscious lyrics didn't jive with the light, poppy, Huey Lewis-style music. This album contains my least favourite Bowie lyric so far: I've touched down with vermin, cowardice, lice. That's just lovely. Obviously it's supposed to be icky, and I get what he was doing with Shining Star (Makin' My Love). Normally I like it when there is a contrast between lyrical themes and music styles, but this just made me go "eww". Also, Mickey Rourke rapping? I'm noping that so hard.

A handful of songs will make it into my iTunes rotation. Despite its generic 80's vibe, I really like Zeroes. It does what it's supposed to do. It makes me happy. And the album's title track has good things going for it. It's so personal and hopeful. And you know what? Despite its ridiculousness, I'm taking Glass Spider with me, even if it sounds like Bowie trying too hard to be... well... himself. Maybe that's what I like about it. He's still in there. Glass Spider may be a bit comical, but it harkens back to a time before the mid-80's when Bowie was all about putting his weirdness out there. 

Weird Bowie = good Bowie.