I hate being sick. The aches and pains, the exhaustion, the feeling of forced confinement all drive me to a state of high irritation. That being said, there are a few perks to being trapped at home by a fever and a raw throat--time to write and read, time to nap, freedom to drink as much honey lemon tea as I want. That sort of thing.
Yet sick time is frowned upon in the United States in a thousand little ways, from mandatory write-ups for those exceeding their one to three sick days, to the practice of perfect attendance awards in the public schools--as though a child could elect not to contract chicken pox or strep throat. We reward the healthy and punish the frail just as though we believed illness to be a moral choice. Not even the Puritans were so mean-spirited.
At the root of our feelings toward illness is, I believe, a cultural prejudice against idleness. Idleness tends to be looked upon solely as a vice by our culture (idle hands, after all, are the devil's playground) , but I would contend that a certain amount of idleness is necissary for anyone hoping to be truly productive and live a ballanced life.
It is my contention that anything can become a vice when done to excess We need food to survive. Eating only becomes a vice when we are gluttons. We need work to support ourselves and to fulfill our potential, but if we neglect family in favor of career we are simply vicious. Just so idleness. People need fallow time in order to digest complex problems, to engage in lateral thinking, hell, just to recharge. Idleness only becomes a vice when it turns into sloth.
Anyway, that's my two cents. I'm going to go and be sick now.
Yet sick time is frowned upon in the United States in a thousand little ways, from mandatory write-ups for those exceeding their one to three sick days, to the practice of perfect attendance awards in the public schools--as though a child could elect not to contract chicken pox or strep throat. We reward the healthy and punish the frail just as though we believed illness to be a moral choice. Not even the Puritans were so mean-spirited.
At the root of our feelings toward illness is, I believe, a cultural prejudice against idleness. Idleness tends to be looked upon solely as a vice by our culture (idle hands, after all, are the devil's playground) , but I would contend that a certain amount of idleness is necissary for anyone hoping to be truly productive and live a ballanced life.
It is my contention that anything can become a vice when done to excess We need food to survive. Eating only becomes a vice when we are gluttons. We need work to support ourselves and to fulfill our potential, but if we neglect family in favor of career we are simply vicious. Just so idleness. People need fallow time in order to digest complex problems, to engage in lateral thinking, hell, just to recharge. Idleness only becomes a vice when it turns into sloth.
Anyway, that's my two cents. I'm going to go and be sick now.
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