running: the dawn

Oh. My. Wow.

I blame statistics.  Really.

I spent all day yesterday in my how to teach statistics workshop.  If I am going to be completely honest, I don’t like statistics.  Yes, I know that it’s math, so I yes I’m supposed to like it.  There’s something very foreign about the language that statisticians use.  I sat in class all day yesterday thinking about how lost I was and how I’m sure that its the exact same emotional response that my calculus students feel.  So, as an exercise in empathy, I tried to find value in the experience.  Outside of that, there was very little redemptive qualities in the class.

The real fun came after class.  Lincoln is one of my favorite towns in America.  It truly is a jewel.  Most people dismiss it, and honestly, I’m ok with that because then it can stay relatively small.  I love that it’s a small town, but it feels like it’s big.  There are tons of diverse ethnic restaurants (and we’ve discussed how my favorite part of traveling is eating good food).  I love bike paths and/or trails.  Lincoln has them in abundance!  True, it’s crazy hot, which has me scared to run outside, but it’s nice to know that I could if I wanted to .

I was able to go to yummy Thai food with some great friends!  Then we hung out and caught up on life before the thing in my eye started taking over my life.

What thing?  I hear you ask…

I have no idea.  All I know is that my eye started tingling and itching a little bit.  For a contact-wearer, this is not really all that alarming.  I’m used to having things touching my eye.  I’m pretty strong about it.  Not this time.  My eye went entirely red and started gushing water.  It was slightly alarming.  But I figured it had something to do with my contacts and once I got back and could take them out, everything would be fine.

Nope.

I woke up this morning and wow-ow!  I tried to go to Jazzercise, but half way through class I had to stop.  I felt like crying and screaming out.  On the drive home I decided that I needed to get this situation looked at by a professional.  To the doctor I went.  I was a little embarrassed.  I actually got to the doctor’s office before they opened and as soon as the sweet receptionist unlocked the doors I was at her desk, water dripping from my eye.  It actually hurt bad enough that some of it was actual crying tears.  I must have looked pretty awful because she made sure that I got rushed right back to see the doctor.  I felt a little bad for the nurse that called my name…by that time I was noticeably crying and had a hard time saying my name and answering questions like “how long has this been going on?”  She decided to put some drops in my eye.  Describing them at asprin for the eye.  I’ll tell you what.  That stuff was amazing!  It was like “Pain-be-gone”.  Instantly I felt amazing and a little silly that I’d been crying so much.

Apparently this was not a miracle cure.  In fact she quickly got the doctor in so that he could examine me before the effects wore off and I curled back into the fetal position.  I wish I could remember more what he said exactly.  I was so deliriously happy that my eye felt so great that I wasn’t really listening.  He did say something about the outer layer of my cornea having some spots of irritation that could either be from an allergy to my contact solution or a virus.  Either way, it would be treated with drops over the next few days.

Awesome.  The pain returned.  I sat through another day of trying to understand a foreign language.  Luckily, now I get to get up and go to the bathroom every 2 hours to put horribly painful drops in my eyes.  Lovely.

Honestly, I think my body is just rejecting the new knowledge (i.e. statistics) and now is flushing it out.