Boy Trouble

Today, I have mostly been daydreaming about life on the Great Barrier Reef.

It's dangerous territory for sure. Now is not really the time to be remembering those sun-kissed, glorious days on the pristine white sands, or those wondrous diving adventures teeming with colourful marine life. No, two more days and it could all be over - my little heart crushed and those splendid memories back where they came from: in the 'maybe again one day, if you happen to win the lottery' box.

Really, I should forget about Australia and spend this time preparing my CV, sending off my writing to potential employers and looking forward to a good old British summer - in case the news on Thursday night isn't good. Yes, that was what I planned to spend my day doing, but I was fooling nobody.

I stumbled down the stairs and entered the kitchen. "Good morning little Lane, how are you today?" enquired Adelaide's Mum.
"50% excited, 50% nervous" I answered, "Oh, and good morning to you, too."
"Hmm..." Adelaide's Mum continued. "We need to do a life wheel for you."
(Adelaide's Mum is a creative life coach and has a variety of tricks up her sleeve to illustrate the fact that your life is never quite as sound as you think it is.)
"What? Why? I haven't even had breakfast yet!" I stuttered.
"Yes, that's exactly the point. It's 8am and you're already talking about the Great Barrier Reef again."
"That's a bit of a wild accusation!" I retorted, a little defensively, "I haven't said anything about the reef AT ALL!"
"No, but you implied it. You implied with your percentages that your entire life is consumed by this job."
"Ok, fair enough," I said, contemplatively, "I suppose, if I'm honest, those percentages were a little inaccurate - at least 10% of me is probably hot cross buns at the moment".
She laughed. "I wondered why the bread bin was empty! I'm serious though, there's more to your life than work you know. What about your family, your health, etc? You need to re-shuffle those percentages and make room for other things. You've been back from travelling three weeks now and you still haven't seen a doctor about Billy and the boys*."

She was right. That's the thing about Adelaide's Mum - she always is. I really should have seen a doctor. It's about four months ago now that I wrote a blog about contracting parasites in India. It's been so long, in fact, that it's become a bit of a running joke between my friends and family. They invite 'Sarah and co.' round for dinner, and write on invitations 'feel free to bring a +1 (Sarah Louise - you can bring +50)', and other such witty comments. She was so right. I couldn't just ignore this because an amazing job opportunity had arisen - my health is important to me. I decided there and then to finally get myself to the doctors.

It was too late to make an appointment, so I braved 'sit and wait' surgery. After an hour and a half of trying not to breath (because I was convinced the girl in the next seat was coughing some sort of contagious disease over me), I was finally in. I explained the situation to the doctor and she looked at me, tilted her head, and gave me a reassuring look. "Don't worry," she said, kindly. "It sounds as if you probably did have some form of parasite, but these things just die off after a couple of months, so you should be fine now."

I should have been happy. But, instead, I felt a pang of sadness. Without realising it, I had grown quite accustomed to the idea of sharing my belly with a few extra friends. These guys weren't just parasites to me - they were a part of my life. We'd been through a lot together. My friends and family loved them like their own, I'd planned a future for them in Australia, hell - I was still blaming 50% of my food consumption on them! To think that they'd just left without even so much as a goodbye was... well... sad really.

Still, at least I know I'm all fit for the island now. I may be 0% parasite, but I'm still ridiculously excited, and even with my small percentages of nerves, fear and hot cross buns... I've decided I'm still leaving a little bit of space for daydreaming about Australia. Whatever the outcome of this job, I know I'll return again someday - even if I do have to win the lottery first...

*For my new readers:
Billy = My fictional (I hope) tapeworm, created by my friends to explain my insatiable appetite, yet complete lack of growth.
The boys = The parasites I believe I contracted in India that caused me to sleep continuously for 3 whole days, throw up a few times, and seriously push the boundaries of friendship between myself and my travel buddy at the time.