The Story of The Crazy Hippy and the Antiviral Drug

A big, fat grasshopper lay exploded in the road. Its exoskeleton and innards looked not unlike a confetti balloon that had been popped. Sadly, tis the season. Autumn: a time when enormous grasshoppers meet their ends.

The street was already heating up, but it made little difference to the boy, who felt everything at an elevated temperature. Sadly, tis the season. Autumn: a time when mothers take their children to the doctor to resolve the age old Is it strep throat or flu? conundrum.

When a mother must go to a place to resolve a conundrum like that, she has to be ready. She must know her purpose, know what is not her purpose, and have that special tune already playing in the back of her mind.

The Morning Sun Blasted Gold Light Down onto Everything
...and touched all the edges of the plants with a glorious shine. Everything was in full bloom, relishing the drop in the intense summer humidity. There was the gleam of goldenrod ready to inflame my sinuses, and crepe myrtle starbursts ready to explode their seeds into the world at any moment. Walking in autumn a person can almost feel the turn of the world, year after year, season after season, time—just spinning away. And how glorious to be a part of it.

That’s just the sort of intoxication the grasshopper had before he crossed the road.

We Crossed the Road Successfully
...and wound our way into the best place in town to catch the flu—for the souls that have not already been infected with this season’s Is it strep throat or flu? conundrum.

A brief, unenthusiastic office employee put on half a smile like maybe she didn’t hate us for adding to her work load by calling in for a last minute “sick visit” appointment. One of those air cleaning machines was running and I think it may have been sucking the virus particles straight out of my son’s nose into its ribbed filter. We sat on the uncomfortably discolored cloth cushions of some chairs likely more covered in germs than fabric. The tune was already humming.

Then back we went, beckoned by a nurse with a nice disposition. I liked her. She abandoned us for a nurse with a Q-tip that came to talk and not listen. “Just a quick twist in the nostril and out it comes,” she said, wielding her weapon toward my son, who dutifully accepted it. I felt the tune humming louder in the back of my mind, readying itself.

“Flu B,”
...the doctor announced as he washed into the room like a wave crashing against the sand. He settled his laptop against the unused examination bed and began typing, eagerly ready to dispense that prescription. “We will prescribe Tamiflu for the boy, and for the toddler as well as a preventative.”

“Is that really necessary?” I said in that practiced voice of polite skepticism. Then he turned and gave me The Look—it’s the oldest trick in the doctor book. The Look says: You are a crazy hippy to question the power of pharmaceuticals. Even worse—you are irresponsible. I am the supreme authority over your children’s health, and the government said to give everyone Tamiflu. No one questions the government, unless they are crazy hippies.

And That is When a Mother in Just Such a Position Whips Out Her Secret Weapon
...by entering safe mode. The doctor’s face was frozen there in that instant in time with The Look plastered on it. I fetched the lipstick out of my purse and drew a pretty smiley face over top of it. Then I turned up the volume on that readied tune, and the orchestra began to play.

Cicadas struck up in one quadrant of the room, then the crickets, a few baritone night hawks put in their two-cents, and a lone owl hooted to its heart’s content. The buzzing orchestra filled the ears until suddenly the meaning of The Look wasn’t present anymore.

The inner voice speaks: I came here to get a strep test because scarlet fever doesn’t just happen in The Velveteen Rabbit. I came for the test, not antiviral pharmaceuticals. My children are not in a high-risk age category, they are not immunosuppressed, they do not have breathing problems, and therefore are not in need of antiviral drugs that have enough common side effects that some pediatricians won’t even prescribe them.

And then a mother in this situation blinks. And there he is, still with the look on his face, and I—we mothers—speak up. “We will hold off.”

The doctor closed his laptop in a disapproving way. We stood and walked out, having accomplished what we came for—a proper diagnosis, and no unnecessary drugs.

Hippy?
...I thought on the way through the office. Maybe. But crazy? I snorted indignantly as the orchestra began to play again, serenading me all the way to the car, lipstick still in hand.

_{Twelve hours after leaving the doctor's office, the boy is on the mend - no antivirals required.}