Seriously, hay fever is nothing to sneeze at.
It hurts. You can’t see. You can’t breathe. You can’t talk. You can’t swallow. Yo can’t type. No hang on, that’s only one of my symptoms. It affects everybody in similar and different ways, but everyone who suffers suffers. Seriously suffers.
I love being outside on a hot sunny day. Feeling the warm sun on my face and feeling completely and utterly relaxed. Then, I notice the delicious smell of freshly cut grass.
I love the smell of freshly cut grass, it does smell really fresh.
Several minutes later, I start to recognise the tiniest of tickles in the corner of one of my eyes. I ignore it, but it continues, gently tickling the same spot, over and over again.
Eventually, I can’t resist, and slowly and carefully itch the corner of my eye. Bliss. Absolute bliss takes away the gentle tickling. For a second or so. Then the tickling returns. More ferocious. Screaming ITCH ME! ITCH ME! in the way only a gentle tickle can.
The more I itch, the more bliss I feel, the more the tickle wants to be itched. A never ending cycle of torture and relief, all within a fraction of a second. And, true to form with never ending things, something in the cycle ends.
No, not the tickle. That stays. It is relentless.
No, not the relief when I perform the itching motion. That becomes a subconscious act.
The bliss ends. There is nothing worse than bliss ending. But sadly, in this case, it does. The eye begins to hurt. The tears begin to flow. The eye begins to swell. The skin begins to glow.
Redder and redder, hotter and hotter. Itch and relief, itch and relief.
Then, the throat starts. A tightening. A different kind of tickling. A dry sensation. The combination of these feelings cause, once more, the eyes to start watering. So they get redder still.
After the eyes and the throat, the nose joins in. A throb. A drip. A tickle – oh a different tickle again to the one in the corner of the eye and the throat, but a tickle never the less. A sneeze quickly follows, which causes more eye watering and throat tightening, tickling and drying.
By this time, people around start to notice.
“Ooh, I didn’t know you had a cold”, one will say. “Oh, my!” another will say. I can’t reply. I have all this going on around my face, and they want to talk! I have to smile at them. The smile is obviously strained. More of a grimace in fact. At least I try to smile.
Then, something untoward happens.
Everything seems clear. The eyes are dry and itch free. The throat is clear and comfortable. The nose is fine. The glorious sunshine is over head, and everything once again is perfect.
And then, a gentle breeze blows in. It brings a lovely aroma of fresh flowers from somewhere nearby.
The corner of the eye starts. The throat tightens. The nose aches. The cycle puts on another stunning performance until the effects fade away once more.
Sometimes, I find going inside helps. Only sometimes. Other times, my symptoms continue in exactly the same way inside as they did outside. Taking anti-allergy tablets help, but they make me feel drowsy – even the ‘non-drowsy’ ones. When I have to force myself to keep my eyes open, they end up watering just as much as when the hay fever dance is just commencing. Either way, I’ll end up with red eyes.
But, hey (< 
) it all passes the time, I suppose…
The Mansionic Perspective 
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