The sun is making a cameo appearance in the sky again as I type this. It is good to see it again. In case you haven’t heard, we had 3 consecutive ice storms smite the Central Arkansas area in the last 3 days.
Ice is the worst. With snow you can at least get around and occasionally drive. It is not advisable on the hilly street the Deacon and I live on. But you can do it. Not so with ice. I looked out on the skating rink in my back yard and visions of hip fractures danced in my head.
All you can do under the circumstances is to stock up on provisions, resign yourself to camping out indoors until the “weather event” ends and hope that the power stays on. We had coffee, food, booze and internet access. Could be worse. And for a lot of poor souls it IS worse. God help them and the social agencies that provide food and warm shelter to those that are without. Their’s is a mighty work indeed.
Still, despite the fact that we wanted for nothing, this 3-4 day period of isolation felt oddly familiar. And not in a good way. I remember autumn 3 years ago. The world as most Americans knew it had shut down. Joe came home from college. Melissa quit teaching in person. She, Joe and all of my teacher buddies became acquainted-or better acquainted-with Google classroom and/or Zoom.
Deja vu all over again. Only this time without kids. Consider. Most of us were stuck once again in our homes. Melissa was back to teaching occupational therapy online which has got to be damned difficult to do while I tried to stay out of the way. I received texts from my teacher friends, mostly during their prep periods. Just like 3 years ago none of us had anybody to talk to except each other. And mostly by text.
The heating system here even went out again briefly and then revived itself some 3 hours later. It has worked fine ever since. Only this time unlike 3 years ago I didn’t pay a repair man to stand in the driveway and say “Man. That’s strange” as my stepdaughter was yelling “The heater just came on!” from the front porch. This go-around I accepted it on faith that the damn thing would kick back on. And for once my faith was rewarded. And I didn’t have to write anybody a check.
The last few days being cooped up in the house brought back terrible memories of a terrible time when COVID was a death sentence. Scientists were racing to find a vaccine while idiots and charlatans foolishly hawked quack cures like Ivermectin and household disinfectants. One of that number happened to be the President of the United States. Truly that was a horrible time that will live in infamy upon history’s immortal scroll.
We should never forget just what a terrible time the pandemic was. It touched virtually every segment of our society and we are just now getting up on our feet. Just in time for a handful of fools in the House to threaten to cause a default on the sovereign debt of the United States by refusing to raise the debt ceiling to pay for bills already appropriated by-guess who?-the damn Congress.
But there is nothing I can do about it other than to accept on faith-since I seem to be doing that more lately-some common sense will kick in on its own up there on the Hill. But I know what I can and will do. I’m going to write a check for a homeless ministry instead to a heating and air company.
That’s what I can do. And I can be glad that spring, and baseball, is not all that far away.
1 comment:
Wonderful and thought provoking as usual ….
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