ellenspictures

Category: Optimism

  • Pandemic Version 20.22? Entering Year Three…

    Pandemic Version 20.22? Entering Year Three…

    Favorite old phrase from a Neil Young song title… “Here we are in the years…”

    2022 kicked us off with one of us having a moderate case of COVID-19, Omicron Variant presumably. The rest of us were either mildly affected briefly, then asymptomatic. Some of us got tested and that is how we determined that we actually had the virus – else, our symptoms would not have driven us to be tested. That was the vaccination effect – according to our doctors, that is what the vaccinations do for us. Our moderate case likely would have been more severe, and could have become a hospital case, without the help of the vaccination immunity boosts.

    We didn’t lose our taste or smell, thank goodness, and our lungs were not impacted. The rest of it was headache, cough, sore throat, fevers and chills, and brain fog – then the residual tiredness that you hear about, that comes on suddenly and says “whoa, stop and rest…”

    The asymptomatic of us never lost energy, had fevers or chills, or were impacted any more than having a sinus headache and itchy eyes for one day, then a bit of stuffiness – but at the same time we had a high pollen count alert, due to the warm weather – so, who knows? We had both.

    It’s difficult now to say how to approach this. We continue to mask-up, avoid large crowds, don’t eat out unless it’s outside… We go outdoors and that is our haven. I find going into stores extremely stressful. I come out and am relieved to be out of there. People are weird and rude and it’s just a strange experience. Some without masks look defiantly at those of us that wear them. But, it’s hard to tell.

    We have the attitude that we will still do what we can, because we believe that we could get infected again. It’s like I feel about the flu – even if you had your shots, you may still get some variant that wasn’t in the shot. Vaccines for COVID-19 are different, but the main thing is to keep your immunity up as much as possible.

    If you think about it, it’s grim – but, there are those of us who try not to lose hope…

    We haven’t seen some our family for going on three years. One of us has parents, still living, that are advancing into their eighties. We have missed birthdays and will miss a wedding. My mother-in-law is very sad and breaks out tearily, but tries not to upset us, but this actually does bring on the emotions that are being kept inside.

    All sorts of prickly emotions happen these days. Adapting since early 2020 has meant more isolation, and less socialization, which really plays with how you interact with people. It’s very tough on some of us.

    We hear news that gives us glimmers of hope for what may be opening in six months – but that, we know, is really too far away to make plans – we now know that something could emerge in a short period of time that could change everything.

    Coping is Hoping

    What we now do is try to anticipate hopeful times. There are countries where this virus variant is just now arriving and spreading. Let’s say that we were third, maybe fourth in line… that leaves many countries at risk, and the virus will ravage their unvaccinated, and leave behind the vaccinated and those who would never get the virus or not know that they have had it – even though science says that most everyone will.

    We have to cope and anticipate what we have to do differently with every wave that comes along. We believe that this will be versioned and each version will require a slightly different surfboard to ride the waves – hopefully, we can still do that without falling off.

    Hope for 2022?

    • That our coping mechanisms will be refined.
    • That we will have better structures and rules to deal with this that can lend us the ability to travel confidently again.
    • That we will be able to travel to see family and friends more.
    • That we will be able to understand how better to bring fun into our lives, rather than the doldrums of work and everyday routines.
    • Anticipation of every visit from our grandchild, or friends who are brave enough to venture out and socialize with us.

    By this writing, we are still here. We hope to be here. I have health on my agenda. I swim every day that the weather permits. I try to eat healthy and do other things with my time towards health – because it’s up to me to do that.

    -Hope Never Vanishes

    January 24, 2022

  • adapting. it’s not dark yet.

    adapting. it’s not dark yet.

    Watching our church service via Facebook is an interesting adaptation to using technology to keep with a routine – to gather with people online – of course it is one way, streaming, but there is a capability for sending messages to everyone. It is Lent. Jesus is a healer. “I once was blind, but now I see.” Famous story. This is a very key story for now. It contains a number of paradoxes. It involves faith and struggles – questioning in the midst of something that people do not understand.

    We are blinded to understanding. We must have faith to continue on. We are all in this together. The outcome is not ours to control. We must try not to fear because fear disables our abilities to think clearly. It does not mean that we should not be aware and react. It means that we need to keep calm and have faith that if there is a solution, it will come because good smart people are working on this, diligently, and with as much haste as is possible. If there is not a solution, it is for a reason. That is quite a different kettle of fish. It would be the life of the world to come.

    So, it’s not dark yet here. We wake up still and we are OK. The dog is barking and doing her usual routine. She doesn’t know that there is something threatening out there – the unseen, but known threat is microscopic and she cannot sense it. She can sense the squirrels (her always top named threat), and all the people and dogs going in front of the house. She comes and visits to check on me and get a treat – and to bark at the people who pass by my window.

    There is a great weight that is pressing on all of us that reorients our thinking. We are not focused on what it was that we focused on a month ago. A month from now, if we are still able, we will focus on whatever it is that we are dealing with then. For now, be here now.

    Every day I wake up and try to have a good attitude about all of this. Reading the news of the world is a double-edged sword kind of exercise. It can be scary. It can be anxiety producing. On one hand, it underscores the ramifications of the poor choices that our past election put into motion. Whether this was the hand of a foreign manipulation doesn’t matter. It is what it is. Congress can’t do anything right now except try to figure out how to act without him disabling them.

    November elections are coming. If he continues to drift as he has been into spewing nonsense and meddling in stuff he shouldn’t be meddling in, it will seal his one-term fate. We can only hope that the country is not destroyed by his actions any more than he has already destroyed it.

    Enough of that. We watch helplessly hoping that a solution comes soon – in the meantime, it’s all about “flattening the curve” the now pervasive motto that many have adopted. It’s down to the individual to behave to help this, no matter how hard it is to do this. We will all be sacrificing something in order to keep alive and keep well.

    Complacency is what we reach when there has not been a huge disruption in our lives. If you have ever lived with an underlying, “always there in the background” threat, you understand what it means to be alert to signs that something might be happening. Something that will disrupt. Gut level uncertainty. Some people have more acute sensors than others. We all live on some sort of scale as we are judged by others. For some of us complacency has never been an option. Ever. When we near feeling that way, the switch gets flipped to worry mode. That’s just how it is with some of us who have lived life with certain experiences.

    My experience with family members and poor health outcomes has influenced the way I live, to a certain extent. It has painted boundaries around some of my habits.

    For instance, certain members of my family think I am a “health nut” — just because I practice, by and large, eliminating certain food elements from my diet, because I have a genetic predisposition to heart disease. I have tried to explain, but they still give me a look, and we just move on. I think, “you had to have been there…”.

    For them, it is likely a foregone conclusion that just doing whatever they want in terms of their diet gets them an outcome that they accept. Live for the moment. I envy that. I’ve tried it. For me, it hasn’t worked, yet.

    I think amongst them, I have been labeled. Here’s why I think this — I’ve been given “vegetarian” cookbooks for gifts. I’m not a vegetarian, but someone must think that I am. I don’t eat a lot of meat, and prefer fish and chicken, but I do eat meat occasionally – and I insist on good cuts of meat, not just any meat…

    I have one friend who always makes sure to bring “gluten-free” items to my house (for me). I’m not gluten intolerant. I don’t eat gluten-free on purpose, but sometimes what I eat is gluten-free. I don’t think about it when I buy those items. I don’t know why this assumption was made, but to my knowledge, I’ve never indicated that I was that. Yet, now, I hear it from others in our community of friends that they assumed I’m gluten-free.

    I just try to cut certain things out of my diet. I don’t make others do this. However, I get heavy pressure to “splurge” a little, when there are fat and sugar laden goodies, fresh from the oven. Over the years, I have relaxed some, but definitely guard against forming habits. I go back to cutting those things out of my diet as a norm. I can measure by the five pounds I gain whenever I am around that stuff how it affects me. The other aspect is that I don’t get as much activity in every day at those times. Blood work results tell the tale, as well. That is an example of my situation and how I manage it. I know what works for me.

    I guess, with me, I observed people smoking, eating unhealthy food, and not being active, and saw what happened. So, beginning in the mid-1970’s, I went to Weight Watchers, lost 50 pounds, and embarked on a journey to not be obese. Unfortunately, as we have learned, you struggle not to gravitate to that highest weight for the rest of your life. It messes with your metabolism, big-time.

    But, I still try to eat whole foods vs. processed ones, and I try to perhaps over-correct for my genetics, hoping that I can eek out a few more years than my predetermined estimated life span – that predicts I’ll be around until my late-70’s to mid-80’s. I still have conditions that are likely inherited, that I have to vigilantly manage.

    These are tiresome tasks. Yet, I know by experience what happens if I give in and give it up.

    But despite best attempts, there will be existential threats that will overcome any prevention that we’ve tried to put in place. Like now.

    Despite doing my best, I know that something else could prematurely push me off the planet, and this all is within a “risk set”. Rogue viruses and such are within that risk set, along with being killed in an accident, murdered, or as a victim of a wide-scale natural or human-made disaster.

    This virus we are dealing with right now is likely a combination of a natural and human-introduced disaster. In my opinion, eating strange (to us) animals, not inspected or certified to be free of disease, is a human-caused disaster, again that is in my opinion.

    Here – in most places there are cautions against eating raw meat – fish – oysters – any of the above that have been inspected… Might be re-thinking this… But, we know that bats and this critter called a pangolin that kind of looks like an armadillo cousin, are where this virus crossed over to the human side. Bats have been implicated in the past. Now, I know that we all laugh about road-kill chili (throwing in some armadillo meat), but nobody does that. Armadillos are known to carry diseases, so besides in zoos, people tend to keep their distance from our world famous armored local mammals. People shoot squirrels and rabbits, and make stews out of them, but they cook these at high temperatures, never eating them raw (unless a person is on drugs or hallucinating or something).

    Not to play the blame game, but if… if… wishes were horses, we would ride away… and we wish that whoever ate that raw wild animal and was “patient zero”, had thought better of that. Likely, they are not around to tell the tale.

    But for the immediate and near future, it is about watching for that day when we see the sun rising up over the trees – when we realize that just maybe we are going to see this pandemic come to an end. Then our task is to get ourselves collectively better prepared to handle the next one – and there will most assuredly be a next one.

    It’s going to be awhile before that day arrives. Looking at the numbers, and still not understanding what the scientists have concluded as they are still learning… yes, it will be our new normal. We are adjusting. We will adapt. Just like after 9/11. We had to adapt. And, it’s not dark yet.

  • observations. squeezing or collaborating?

    observations. squeezing or collaborating?

    Competition. Humans are hard-wired to compete. It is in our DNA as we have evolved into more sophisticated competitive spaces – for all of those streams that give us the ability to survive, at the most basic innate levels, we have various mechanisms inside us that drive us to compete.

    Populations are growing. Food, water, and shelter sources are threatened. Weather is becoming more erratic and threatening to human populations. What we are witnessing is change. Fractional evolution going backwards to more tribal less global.

    Why is this? Economic. Oppression. Suppressed feelings from ages back where our ancestors held rage and the festering over generations occurred to this point. License to rage by leaders who rage.

    Where are we now? Facing serious historic changes – and it is happening everywhere. Some places more dramatic than others. Where are we headed? This remains to be seen.

    For every dismal forecast, there is the forecast of the possibility of hope. When we are at our lowest points, we have fewer expectations for the broader scope. Small steps towards hope vs. large leaps towards some nirvana. Perhaps more down to earth. More realistic.

    People without food or resources see any food or resources differently than those who say, “What shall I cook for dinner tonight?” Children without toys, see imaginative play in any object whereas children with many toys get bored easily at times because they are overwhelmed with choices and their minds are numbed to be able to make them.

    Nothing like something life threatening to crystallize your opinions about the value of life – and what comes after. On a spiritual journey some of us have gone down variant paths to find that the journey we thought we were on wasn’t what we thought it was. Lose your religion? It happens. Looking for birds of a feather? It is deep within our human core to seek out other humans to enable ourselves to feel less lonely. Yet loneliness can occur even if you are with someone if there is distance or estrangement.

    Now more than ever, we need to have the capabilities to be prepared for what happens next. We have deluded ourselves into thinking that “everything will be all right” when suddenly, it looks as if our worst nightmares are coming true. But hope and pleas for sanity to prevail are two things that we who see the situation for what it is to be, carry around within our selves and act upon.

    It is a dark time. Zero Dark Thirty. Not quite the 11th hour, but that will come soon. Despite sunny days, it is dark right now. What we hope for is that there will be light after the darkness.