Krank & Cranky – How to Stay Kind While Feeling Awful

Take the word krank – German for “ill.” It describes that alarming state when something inside your otherwise well-oiled machinery suddenly stops cooperating. Somewhere in the body’s broom closet, Krank clears its throat and whispers: “Hey, remember me?”
The owner of said broom closet – you – notices quickly that the inner factory is no longer running smoothly. Every organ depends on another and prays that the others are awake and ready to help.

On a healthy day, we don’t give this symphony a second thought.
We humans are spoiled. We rarely thank our bodies – the cells, the nerves, the synapses, the tireless immune system – for working day and night without vacation or pay raise.

But when the system crashes, the complaints start instantly.
“Why me? Everything worked perfectly yesterday!”
Yes, my friend, yesterday doesn’t count anymore. Today you have a meeting with a malfunction – and the malfunction has brought a friend.

Being krank doesn’t have many perks. It makes you weak, sore, and occasionally existential.
Suddenly, the years of perfect service from your miraculous body count for nothing. Illness has entered the chat.

So, what now?
Luckily, there are specialists, doctors, and clinics – the body’s workshops – who try to repair the damage. Medical science is one of humanity’s most impressive inventions, a discipline that fixes, replaces, and often performs small miracles.

Still, when you’re the patient, it doesn’t feel miraculous at all.
Fear and frustration surface, and soon Krank invites its English cousin Cranky over for tea.

Cranky?
Yes, that wonderfully odd word from the 19th-century English toolbox.
It comes from crank – to turn or wind. Maybe it harks back to the days when cars were started with a hand crank: jerky, unpredictable, and a bit dangerous. Over time, cranky came to describe people who behave the same way – moody, irregular, and slightly twisted.

And when Krank and Cranky team up, beware.
The first makes you miserable; the second makes everyone else miserable too.

Most people try to resist the partnership. They reach instead for hope, humour, or at least a decent cup of tea.
Few of us wish to entertain Cranky for long.

I’ve been krank for two days now, and I’m on full alert to keep Cranky from sneaking into my loft. That grumpy intruder has no place in my usual state of mind. I’m too busy hauling myself, by the metaphorical hair, back toward healthy mode.

What exactly am I suffering from? No idea.
Could be a flu, a cold, maybe COVID, maybe just life.
But the ancient remedy still works: tea, rest, and patience until the body calls off the strike and quietly resumes operations.

I’ll report back when headquarters are running again.