On fragility

Every now and then, things happen where you feel very fragile.

At the end of my holiday visit, I decided to take my parents out to the fish market for a good meal, as a way of thanking them for looking after me and M3 whilst my wife is overseas with M1 and M2.

It was good, I thought. My dad complained about the heat, but I loved the sun, the crowd, hunching over the bench and eating seafood like in my university days.

That was until I started feeling ill on the way back.

The nausea came quickly, and the movement of the tram made it worse. I tried to sit, but it didn’t go away, and I thought if I kept going, I wouldn’t last the journey home on the train.

So I said to my parents, “I am going to get off at the next station and walk around the city.”

It wasn’t that unusual for me to wander alone. I left M3 with them as I got off.

It wasn’t pleasant—walking alone in the city, feeling increasingly ill with nowhere to stop, I started to wonder if it was a good idea to go off alone.

Eventually, I ended up in a busy shopping centre.

At the back of the centre, down those quiet corridors, I saw a sign “Security” and next to it, a green cross—the universal symbol of medical aid.

It’s funny that you always see those crosses and know what they mean, but I have never been so relieved to see one as I was in that moment—one that seemed to speak directly to me.

The guard drew up the blinds and said, “You look very confused.”

I explained my situation, and he said, “You are safe here. You can rest.” I took a seat and got a glass of water.

The nausea got worse, and I started feeling chills. I began to time the waves as various guards came and went.

It was an interesting situation—not the nausea and chills, but the specific configuration I found myself in.

I ran out of data, so I couldn’t message my wife. She was overseas anyway. I tried messaging my sister, but it wouldn’t connect, and she had just started a road trip that day. I didn’t want to call my parents back. And getting home was out of the question. I could barely walk.

Suddenly, everything and everyone felt very far away.

As I sat there, timing the nausea, thoughts ran through my head.

The suddenness was what stood out. Just that morning, I was thinking about career plans; in the afternoon I was enjoying food; and then all of a sudden I was alone and not in control of my body.

I kept thinking about Jane Austen’s novels. Her characters go on a country trip and then get sick with no forewarning, and the plot turns. I always thought it didn’t quite fit the narrative, a convenient plot device. But I knew it wasn’t. That’s how it happens—you get sick out of nowhere. I didn’t go out on this bright sunny day, on my last day of the visit, to get sick, but here I was.

Getting sick doesn’t follow any narrative logic—it just happens.

Objectively, I knew I was safe. It was probably the food. I was in the middle of a city. But there’s a big difference between one’s thoughts and one’s body. My mind said “You are fine.” And the body said otherwise.

Fragility is not a statistical fact. It isn’t something you can wrangle in your head. You can think objectively about the best course of action—and take it—but it doesn’t change the experience of not being in control. Fragility is not something you can negotiate.

“Life is so fragile,” I thought.

But most of all, I kept thinking about why I left my parents and went off by myself. Why did I do that? What was behind that thinking?

Why did I want my wife here, most of all? Then I thought, “A spouse is someone who shares in your fragility.”

I sat there, watching the time, wondering if I would get better or get worse. There was nothing to do but wait.