The Two Kinds of Decay

Music

How long was I sick?

I know that March 26, 1995, was the morning I awoke with numb feet.

But before that morning, I’d had a head cold stirring in my body for weeks — an infection for which my immune system had been generating antibodies on top of antibodies.

That head cold triggered the mechanism in my immune system that resulted in the syndrome called CIDP.

But it wasn’t the head cold — it was the great beauty of the Allegri piece that had made me keep the head cold in my body for so long. It was the promise of singing that Allegri solo that made me keep the virus from running its course. I had to put off the cough until after that performance, and instead of going away, the virus waited patiently to be allowed to make me cough.

But that story began in the seventeenth century, before Mozart was even born.

So when did I first get sick?

Getting sick was a process just as getting well was a process.

The most important things must happen slowly, incrementally. Just think — they are always painting some part of the Williams-burg Bridge! This is why moments of transformation are so exciting.

But what appeared as a transformative moment, the moment I awoke on a Sunday with numb feet, only felt like a transformative moment.