Salad bar for the ear

Pain! woke me in the middle of the night.
An earache in the middle of the night and no mommy around for relief.
I grabbed the little used bottle of acetaminophen with shaking hands and opened it like a druggie needing a hit.
As a grandmother I’m supposed to know what to do for most any illness and have everything on hand to treat it. But that night I didn’t have anything I needed.
No thermometer to verify I really was as sick as I felt.
No sweet oil for an earache. I trashed the last bottle a couple years ago when I touched the rubber squeeze bulb and felt the goo of disintegrating rubber. No ear drops and my ear hurt worse than it had in decades.
The clock ticked loudly in the bedroom. After midnight in suburbia, with my husband out of town for the week. I was not inclined to change clothes and drive into town in search of over-the-counter medication.
Foggy with pain, holding a hand over my ear, I went over to my medical bookshelf and pulled out a couple books to research home remedies for common maladies.
“Cut an onion in half, heat the onion, wrap in cloth and press against the ear. The onion juices draw out the infection.”
I had a couple onions.
“Warm a bit of olive oil and apply a bit to the outer ear. It soothes, it does not heal.”
I had olive oil.
“Take a clove of garlic and rest it gently on the ear. Don’t push it in, if it burns, cover it with olive oil.”
Hmmm, maybe there was one stray clove of garlic in the fridge.
Or I could “squeeze the garlic and pour a bit of the juice in the ear.”
“Grind a few basil leaves and extract some juice and apply a couple drops to the ears.”
Make a poultice of the garlic. Make a poultice of onion. Make a poultice of carrots.
Carrots!?
Garlic, onion, basil, olive oil, carrots. A salad bar for my ear.
Then there were the drinks: Tea tree oil, goldenseal, honey and lemon tea.
I seemed to be fresh out of all of those and my ear still screamed for relief.
“Press a small warm bottle of water against the ear. Warm compresses do wonders for breaking up infection and getting the blood flowing again.”
“Take a sock; fill it with salt, heat until it is warm and tolerable to the body. Lay your head on it. This may help drain the fluid out.”
Warmth, heat. This sounded promising.
If my hot water bottle had not developed a hole years ago, I might have considered using that.
Or I could use that other suggestion and ask someone to light up a cigarette to smoke and then blow gently into my ear.
Wait a minute! No smoking allowed at the salad bar.
So much for the published home remedies
I scrounged my cupboards and found chicken noodle soup – the perennial cure for the common cold – which had caused my earache. And I found a long cloth tube of uncooked rice. Simple instructions: place in microwave for one minute then use as a heating pad.
I’ve had it for years. No expiration date, no holes.
I stuck it in the microwave, heated the kernels of rice one minute before wrapping the thing around my neck and pressing the tail against my ear. Ahhh! Much better. I curled up on the couch with my warm comforter and began drifting off to sleep making a mental list of all the things my medicine cabinet needed: Thermometer, sweet oil for the ear, cough drops, hot water bottle, heating pad, garlic, onion, olive oil, carrot pulp … and a package of cigarettes.
I drifted off to sleep and dreamed of little elves smoking while tossing a salad in my ear.
(Joan Hershberger is a reporter at the News-Times. E-mail her at jhershberger@eldoradonews.com.)