Drug Allergy

They give out a typical consent form with a schedule of dates and time slots - It's the annual check-up where I had to remind myself to bring my Health Booklet to school.

I remember fears we had in common: What if we found ourselves barely able to read the rows of letters and numbers on the screen when we covered one eye? What if our "bent backs" revealed distorted spines and 'positive' shows up in our reports? How shall we pretend not to care if we gained weight, or weighed more than the boys?

Yet one thing that bothered me most was not quite what everyone experienced. I carefully made sure my booklet was faced down, or pretended to be poring over the facts of my babyhood while everyone compared their birth weight, head circumference, length.... All because I had a distinctive, stark red label plastered above my name on the cover: DRUG ALLERGY.

As a child I was more familiar with the dominant meaning of 'drug'- illegal, poisonous, addictive, rehab - all which meant I feared my friends judging me should they notice the cover. Of course, in retrospect I would think myself silly to actually have such irrational fears, because my present self would care less about what others think of my drug allergy.

But I remember this fear I experienced because I recently have another stark red label plastered over my appointment card. So I'm writing àbout another childhood fear that I otherwise would have forgotten.

Well, it's red for an obvious reason: A drug allergy determines what medicines I should not take, which the doctor needs to be aware of. But this very reason that served (and still serves) to protect me actually put me on tenterhooks.

I'm curious as to how far this label would follow me. I'm allergic to Penicillin, and I hear people telling me that means I can't take much medicine. But I have no idea what effects Penicillin has on me, or if I'm still allergic to it. And what makes this most interesting is if I actually encounter an experience where I have to make an important decision regarding my health, like that between Penicillin and possibly death.

The levels of experience that writing has helped me to remember and prepared me to anticipate...

Adios

Have you ever had a friend whom you feel you have known for your entire life, yet at different points of time, you realized you felt more like a stranger?

You remember how you used to share your fears, anxieties and hopes with her, and how she used to also feel the same way about many things in life. There were moments when she would pound her fist on the table just because your joke was so funny laughing wasn't enough. Moments when she would grab your arm while walking because she's too tired to support herself. Days when she called you her best friend, and showered you with many gifts and texts because you were at the top of her mind.

But you also come to understand they were short-lived. Few months of transition into the next phase of life, and you realize you no longer see her the way you used to. You thought for many years that she's a friend to keep, but it seems as if all the closeness between you two has turned into a void.

In those memories, you could understand everything she was thinking even before she spoke her thoughts. Yet in those memories, the friend you met has made her leave. You struggle to accept that the friendship lives only in you and what you wrote. Even if you try to make amends, she would only draw a blank. Or maybe tell you she does miss you but nothing changes.

She is now a stranger, whose thoughts need a lot more work to comprehend. You realize that you see in her something you never expected, something so prevalent in everyone else you thought she used to never associate herself with. You come to see her in a new light, and your heart feels not a tinge of pain, but an incomprehensible weight that zaps you of so much energy. Two different identities, one you used to know so clearly, and the other you're crippled trying to understand.

They say maybe people don't change, they just become more of who they are. I've let enough energy and emotions drain me trying to grapple with this change. I accept that there are friendships like this, some real ones that last for only certain points of time in life.

I really needed this closure. Goodbye, stranger.