Invisible illnesses are debilitating in all clinical and social contexts, in that the legitimacy of such health problems is so severely undermined—simply due to the lack of visible symptoms—such that it will never serve as an acceptable justification for absences and avoidance of responsibilities. And so, the irritation on the sides of your fingers, constantly sore and spiking sharp pains with the slightest contact and movements, is rarely acknowledged—it could be a meme, it could be a relatable injury, but it could not be any serious ailment. But the electrifying shock that travels down the back of your hand, the tint of red that refuses to bleed out but rolls its tongue at you, taunting and baiting you into peeling the wound apart further, the agonizing torment that comes with any accidental application of hand sanitizer or cleansing of the wound—like melting the finger with boiling lava, like a million millimeter-wide tridents stabbing the nailbed straight through, like an eternity of hell for the duration of all the diamond mountains of lower Pomerania condensed into a few seconds of pure hot-white stings, like an AED straight to the tip of the phalanges bringing you to convulsions on the floor—and with the social connotations associated with such maladies, all you’re able to mutter is a quiet ow… under your breath. Yet the gash grows larger, the silent misery continues, and even though the keyboard is like a highly sophisticated medieval torture contraption, you bite your lip and finish your essay with that hangnail on your index finger.
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Prompt from Daily Themes Week 10: Adjectives
Write a theme in which you describe a small object or event using extravagant hyperbole to make that object or event ironically seem small (because bloated, puffed). In short, write an exception that proves the rule of litotes. Note: your effects here might involve hyperbole’s tendency to undermine credibility/narrative authority.