SmirkPretty Blog

activism, Career, health, long covid

In Praise of FMLA

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Photograph of a yellow cage holding many stacked cubbies storing a variety of safety hardhats
Photo by Pop & Zebra on Unsplash

In 1993, US President Bill Clinton signed into law the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA). This was one of his first acts as president, and it was the fulfillment of a campaign promise to provide more protection for working families. His predecessor, George H.W. Bush, vetoed it twice despite widespread support for the bill. 

Signing this act into law was, unfortunately, the pinnacle of Clinton’s progressive agenda. He went on to gut welfare and pass NAFTA. Clinton’s presidency is a textbook example of neoliberal abandonment of poor and working class Americans, and by default, almost the entirety of the middle class. 

But at least we have FMLA.

Continue reading “In Praise of FMLA” →
body, Brain, Creativity, health, Letting Go, long covid

Smoke Signals: Notes on Phantosmia

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Photograph of a single orange flower with smoke coming from the blossom and smoke all around.
Photo by Matthew Henry from Burst

Outside, someone was smoking. The stink leaked in around the closed front windows. It stung my eyes as I sat in my partner’s living room in an easy chair, slogging through a work task. This has been my setup for the better part of the past year: balancing on the tightrope between productivity and rest. Pillows, lap trays, things to hold my feet up. Sunlight. Headphones. Pomodoros.

I tried to ignore the smell but it grew stronger. I glanced out but couldn’t see anyone outside. The place is nestled in a cohousing community with a small group of neighbors. Some may light up the occasional joint, but no cigarette smokers. 

So it must be someone delivering a package. Or working on a neighbor’s gutters.

The smell persisted. An hour? More? I kept working and the reek kept lingering. No voices, no sound of hammering. Just birds and crickets, and as far as I know, none of them have taken up smoking.

Continue reading “Smoke Signals: Notes on Phantosmia” →
body, disability, health, Learning, long covid

Maintenance Required: Notes on a Crash

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Photograph of an old rusted out car sitting on a dirt driveway near a fence and some run-down houses. A cactus is growing next to the car.
Photo by Angelique Downing from Burst

In a Disney princess bag behind the passenger seat lives the crash kit. Here is what you’ll find inside:

  • One basic medium pillow
  • One fuzzy neck pillow
  • One blackout eye mask
  • One pair of Loop earplugs
  • One packet of electrolyte powder
Continue reading “Maintenance Required: Notes on a Crash” →
body, disability, long covid

Slow and Steady: Notes on PEM

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Shannon standing on the lookout of a mountain with a view of the sky and coast of Kaua'i. She has a goofy smile and has her hands turned up
A thousand lives ago on Nounou Mountain Trail, or Sleeping Giant (Kaua’i, Hawai’i, 2022)

Going through photos of the last trip before my life changed, I see her. That me is there, radiating all the pain and exhilaration of the little mountain she climbed with her partner on their first day in Kaua’i. 

I love that girl. She was hurting bad from a bum hip that would get replaced in a year, but she powered through it, sun-happy and heart-strong.

She started vanishing just a few short months later, replaced by a body-snatching invasion of Long COVID symptoms. 

The worst of those symptoms? Post-Exertional Malaise. 

Continue reading “Slow and Steady: Notes on PEM” →
body, Brain, disability, long covid, Take Action

Calling for a Skycap: Notes on Fatigue

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Meme of a person smiling and reaching for a balloon that says "COVID is mild" just before the person is grabbed by a figure that says "Long COVID"

While we still have much to learn about long COVID, a growing body of research paints a worrisome picture, and more needs to be done to help understand, prevent and treat long COVID.

– Sens. Tim Kaine (D-VA), Todd Young (R-IN), and former Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) in The Hill, 8/31/23

Imagine this.

You board that long haul flight woozy from too many hours of debauchery. Your center row seat wedges you between a fussy lap baby and a linebacker whose shoulders take up half your headrest. Plus there is the dude behind you who spends the whole flight playing a first-person shooter game balanced on the tray table at your back.

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body, disability, Dogs, Fitness, health, long covid

COVID-versary

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Me: I’ve been thinking a lot about where we were this week last year

Co-worker: Were we in WA? Where your whole life changed and you were so sick??

Me: That’s the place! I was about to be escorted off campus. But it was a great first two days!

It’s the one-year anniversary of my first (and so far, only) COVID infection and I’m spending it much the same way as I spent the week in 2022. Dizzy, queasy, exhausted, and trusting that work can get on without me. 

And bored. So very bored.

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body, community, disability, long covid

See Here: Notes on Long COVID

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Smoke and hand obscure face inside black hoodie.

46,000 of us on a Reddit sub. 60,000 on a private Facebook group. Tens (or even hundreds) of thousands still on Twitter despite the fallout from the buyout. Discord groups. Regional discussion boards. And circles absorbing circles as sub-types make homes in community with those suffering from ME/CFS, MCAS, and other illnesses.

These are just the collected few. We are always dealing with small clusters. Only 10-ish percent who get the virus will end up with post-viral syndrome. A percentage of those show symptoms severe enough, or enduring enough, to register among a baffled medical establishment as more than anxiety, aging, or “all your tests are normal, try meditation and drinking more water.”

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body, Change, disability, Fitness, Living in the Moment

Sticker Shock

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“Take Nothing for Granted”

Says the sticker inside locker 213. 

It’s a sizeable sticker. Bigger than “Deposit Quarter, Take Key.” More insistent than “Be responsible! Always lock your locker!” It hangs there at a cocky angle. Shabby, smug, sure of itself. Shredded at the edges, about five and a half feet off the ground (eye level for some of us). The size just shy of a bumper sticker. An iconoclast. A poseur. Trying to be something different. To proselytize from unlikely, and unavoidable, public soap boxes. Not truck bumpers, no. Instead, utility poles. Bathroom stalls. Park benches. Locker rooms.

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