My Vitamin D Deficiency

A story about a scarf

I haven’t written in a while. I keep typing up intros but can’t get myself to finish them. God willing I will actually post this one.

Happy days with the scarf.

Today I became emotional on my bike ride home from photographing an elementary school bike bus because it was pouring rain and so cold outside. I was ill-prepared for the elements, wearing white pants while riding a bike without fenders, and I was completely soaked and covered in mud almost as soon as I left my house. By the time I was heading back home, I was so soaked that my clothes weren’t functional garments anymore. I think they were actually making me colder. I stood under an awning and chattered my teeth and shook for 10 minutes until I eventually forced myself to carry on.

The whole time I was thinking about this scarf that I wore constantly for months until I lost it a couple weeks ago. That scarf would’ve changed everything for me this morning. But it’s gone now.

This scarf had a couple run-ins with death before it finally met its demise. A few days after I got it it flew off while I was biking, but I realized in time and turned around to find it lying on the street. Then, a couple months ago, I dropped it by accident while I was walking with my roommate Patrick in the snow and didn’t notice until a few hours later. I was very distraught (see the below text messages to Patrick for evidence). I walked around in the dark and found it in the snow, and I was can’t overstate how relieved I was.

My messages to Patrick about the scarf.

The way I lost this scarf for real is worse than if I had lost it in a mysterious spot on the street, because I actually knew exactly where it is. But I can’t get it, because it’s at the home of this classical pianist with antisocial characteristics who I went on a date with a few weeks ago. I went to his house because I wanted to hear him play the piano, but it was not a good idea. He lives by himself in a house that he used to live in with his grandmother. She died 15 years ago, but her stuff is still decorating the house. All the books in the bookshelf are hers, and there are old-timey religious phrases on signs hung up on the wall. Upstairs, there is a room with hardwood floors that is completely empty except for two gongs, one on each side of the room. Overall, I found it off-putting.

Anyway after we examined the gongs and he played the piano he started acting kinda scary towards me and I quickly exited the house, leaving my scarf in the process. And I don’t want to go back and get it.

This isn’t a metaphor or anything. It’s just a story about a scarf. I didn’t even end up crying this morning. I accepted the scarf’s permanent disappearance and the sun came out a little bit. When I got home I put on three pairs of pants and two sweaters and laid under all my blankets for a while. And when I went out again this afternoon I was properly dressed for the weather, so I honestly didn’t even think about the scarf at all.

By the way, I am not intending to seek advice in this blog post. I’ve already thought through having someone go get the scarf for me, and I’ve decided to just leave it in the past. It’s much easier that way, and plus I don’t even really want it anymore.

Since this incident occurred this morning, I’ve decided to believe that all my problems — shivering, being so attached to a scarf that I almost cry over it — are because I have vitamin deficiencies. The last time I got my blood drawn the doctor found out I was so low on Vitamin D she prescribed me the strongest available pharmaceutical dosage to take over a 12 week course. I don’t know if it helped or not. Now I just take the Trader Joe’s ones, which might be placebos. Trader Joe’s is not a serious place to buy vitamins.

So I bought a bottle of multivitamin gummies from a more reputable source, Walgreens. One thing about vitamin gummies is that because they taste so good and you are so limited in how many you are allowed to consume, it might prompt you to go buy some Haribo, which may cancel out the health benefits of the gummies. Another thing about vitamin gummies is someone once told me the first time they got high they got the munchies but didn’t have any food in the house so they ate a full bottle of melatonin gummies.

I’ll let you know if they help. (Maybe.)

In the meantime, here’s an anecdote I feel like sharing but don’t think I can rope it into this post, which is scattered enough as it is.

Last fall, my roommate Dagny and I went to go see a semi-professional production of Little Shop of Horrors. It was a very bad show, in a way that felt really depressing. I was sitting in between Dagny and a family of three: a mother and father and their adult son. They all seemed normal enough, but then right at the start of the show, the three of them took each other’s hands and didn’t let go for the entire 2+ hour musical. Even during intermission they just stayed in their seats, holding hands. Is that actually a cute thing to do and you all think I’m just out to spoil people’s fun and genuine acts of love for their family? Let me know in the comments.