the color orange, and other things twisted by chronic illness

on homeschooling

sometimes

when people ask 

what it's like,

and i am tired

of rattling off symptoms

that will never

really sink in,

i tell them

about my school lunches.

how at first

everything was normal.

in second grade

i had 

PB&Js

and carrot sticks.

then

in fifth grade

the headaches first started.

so the PB&Js,

eaten in our tiny cafeteria,

got put on gluten free bread,

as we searched for

something to blame

for my pain.

for a while

that was it.

then

things got worse.

high school lunches

saw dairy go

and sugar

and lots of

little things

in between.

because no single food

is worth

my joints flaring

or my headaches

making thinking impossible.

the last two years

of high school,

things got worse still.

and at last

even school itself

got removed from school lunches.

i tell them this

and maybe then

they will understand

how robbed 

i sometimes feel

of normal.

give me

my PB&Js

back.