Illustration by Texas Monthly; Getty
Every day when I look at the two-inch gashes in my kitchen counter, I remember my fight with the coconut. I had been stuck in the quicksand of a prolonged recovery from COVID-19; I was a “long hauler.” Although I was doing everything my doctor recommended to feel well again a restricted diet, rest, cryotherapy, a burdensome regimen of daily supplements my body and mind, still weak and foggy two months after my positive COVID test, remained strangers to me.
I felt certain that this fresh coconut, if I could just whack its top off with my big kitchen knife, would make me feel better. But I couldn’t crack it open. I hacked madly. Pieces of its brown shell splintered off and flew around my kitchen. I didn’t care that I kept missing the coconut and chopping into the pretty, white faux-marble countertops we had just installed last summer. This was extremely unlike me I’m patient and careful, not the type to fly off the handle in a moment of