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brin_bellway[cw: what it says on the tin]
Yesterday, I went out. I ran some walking-distance errands, went on a practice hike with my go-bag (conclusion: my shoelaces have degraded to the point where new ones are a *necessity* when walking on remotely uneven ground, not just the nice-to-have they are when merely walking around stores; going to have to figure out how to get them unstuck from their boots)...
...and then I went home, took off my respirator, and went back outside for fifteen minutes. I have a box of desloratadine I've never tested, and I want to know if it works.
I expected it to hurt, even before the physical symptoms set in. I expected a visceral fear or dread, the way I felt the time I went to work in a new brand of surgical mask and found that the mask was *much* lower-grade than I'd thought it was.
It didn't hurt. It felt like power, like connection, like...like being able to see ultraviolet. A whole other side to the world, that was now mine.
The air smelled like autumn. Like long hours outdoors spent trick-or-treating.
I recalled that *not* being able to smell in a coffeeshop *also* felt like power. I recalled reading about late-onset anosmics, and how much they suffer.
Consent, it seems, makes all the difference.
---
I went over to our driveway, and when I looked at my reflection in the car window I found I couldn't recognise it. Which does not make any sense, given that I see myself maskless in the bathroom mirror every day, probably rather more often than I see masked reflections of myself. I did say recently that sooner or later I'm not going to recognise myself in the mirror anymore and it's going to suck, but it *wasn't* that the reflection looked older. It was still young, but its face was the wrong shape, and it had short curly hair.
(Maybe that was it, that the wind over my braid was making the short bits of my hair more noticeable.)
---
At fifteen minutes in, the smell was fading. Perhaps there isn't more to be gained, psychologically, from longer exposures.
As for *physical* effects...approximately nothing. Which is fucking weird, given that last week I got a noticeable amount of sore throat from a *couple of breaths* outside *in the rain*. And by the twenty-minute mark of a solo picnic last November (which I had mistakenly believed to be a safe time period), I had not only had enough *exposure* to trigger a runny nose, my nose was *already starting to complain*.
This happened *last* time I tried to deliberately trigger an allergy attack, too. Still haven't had a chance to test the allergy meds.
I don't get it. Consent's not *that* powerful.
I guess I'll try a longer exposure next time I have a long enough break from work that I wouldn't have to go out sniffling if the exposure works but the meds fail. Maybe Monday.
---
Psychologically, there *was* some dissonance *afterward*. I felt in a better mood, and my memetic immune system was upset by this. Everyone says being out in nature makes you feel better, but Nature is an abusive asshole and I hate that I need a relationship with her.
I should go on more respirator-clad walks, see how important unfiltered air actually is to the benefits of being outdoors. (Last year I spent *very* little time outdoors because I feared that some pollen might slip through the mask and cause false-positive illness symptoms, but it's so much easier to seal an elastomeric.) I might be able to get the best of both worlds. I might be able to have a relationship with nature on *my* terms.
---
(branch 1)
(branch 2)
Yesterday, I went out. I ran some walking-distance errands, went on a practice hike with my go-bag (conclusion: my shoelaces have degraded to the point where new ones are a *necessity* when walking on remotely uneven ground, not just the nice-to-have they are when merely walking around stores; going to have to figure out how to get them unstuck from their boots)...
...and then I went home, took off my respirator, and went back outside for fifteen minutes. I have a box of desloratadine I've never tested, and I want to know if it works.
I expected it to hurt, even before the physical symptoms set in. I expected a visceral fear or dread, the way I felt the time I went to work in a new brand of surgical mask and found that the mask was *much* lower-grade than I'd thought it was.
It didn't hurt. It felt like power, like connection, like...like being able to see ultraviolet. A whole other side to the world, that was now mine.
The air smelled like autumn. Like long hours outdoors spent trick-or-treating.
I recalled that *not* being able to smell in a coffeeshop *also* felt like power. I recalled reading about late-onset anosmics, and how much they suffer.
Consent, it seems, makes all the difference.
---
I went over to our driveway, and when I looked at my reflection in the car window I found I couldn't recognise it. Which does not make any sense, given that I see myself maskless in the bathroom mirror every day, probably rather more often than I see masked reflections of myself. I did say recently that sooner or later I'm not going to recognise myself in the mirror anymore and it's going to suck, but it *wasn't* that the reflection looked older. It was still young, but its face was the wrong shape, and it had short curly hair.
(Maybe that was it, that the wind over my braid was making the short bits of my hair more noticeable.)
---
At fifteen minutes in, the smell was fading. Perhaps there isn't more to be gained, psychologically, from longer exposures.
As for *physical* effects...approximately nothing. Which is fucking weird, given that last week I got a noticeable amount of sore throat from a *couple of breaths* outside *in the rain*. And by the twenty-minute mark of a solo picnic last November (which I had mistakenly believed to be a safe time period), I had not only had enough *exposure* to trigger a runny nose, my nose was *already starting to complain*.
This happened *last* time I tried to deliberately trigger an allergy attack, too. Still haven't had a chance to test the allergy meds.
I don't get it. Consent's not *that* powerful.
I guess I'll try a longer exposure next time I have a long enough break from work that I wouldn't have to go out sniffling if the exposure works but the meds fail. Maybe Monday.
---
Psychologically, there *was* some dissonance *afterward*. I felt in a better mood, and my memetic immune system was upset by this. Everyone says being out in nature makes you feel better, but Nature is an abusive asshole and I hate that I need a relationship with her.
I should go on more respirator-clad walks, see how important unfiltered air actually is to the benefits of being outdoors. (Last year I spent *very* little time outdoors because I feared that some pollen might slip through the mask and cause false-positive illness symptoms, but it's so much easier to seal an elastomeric.) I might be able to get the best of both worlds. I might be able to have a relationship with nature on *my* terms.
---
(branch 1)
(branch 2)
