I’m sitting here with a cold, which means I’m getting that skanky feeling of dehydration when every cubic centimeter of water one consumes is allocated toward snot production. Aside from making me have to cough and blow my nose a lot, it leads me to wonder about the physiology of mucus. Does the body actually use it for something, or is it simply a by-product of some other process? How is it that as soon as I blow it all out, my nose and sinuses seem to fill right back up in less than a second? How does the body produce so much of it so fast? Have any yogis with superior body-wisdom found a way to retain in the body valuable water that might otherwise go to producing worthless snot? Or would that be counterproductive to the healing process?
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This will pretty much complete our series on the lesser bodily secretions, unless somebody really wants to go into the smegma thing. As is true of all God’s creation, mucus is good for you. No doubt you could stand to have a little less of it at times, but this shouldn’t decrease our esteem for a fluid that’s only trying to defend us against germs, dust, and other foreign matter. Evidently, since you got a cold, this defense against germs wasn’t entirely successful. But the mucus is trying! You might show a little appreciation.
As I say, the above mechanism is not a foolproof antimicrobial defense, and sometimes you get a cold. Feeling guilty, your mucus then kicks into overdrive trying to shed this virus or whatever bad thing it is you’ve got. Sometimes it succeeds, at least to the point where you can continue to breathe through your nose. Sometimes it doesn’t and your nose plugs up, and the infection takes root in your sinuses, producing the dreaded green globs and making you sound like your head was whittled from a potato. You think this is better than having a runny nose? I think not. Sorry if I sound like I’m dumping on you, Keith, but I’m trying to put matters in perspective. Your problem isn’t the mucus, it’s the germs.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): Illustration by Slug Signorino.
