PLAYING CHICKEN

A while back in our COVID Compliant self-incarceration period – and I’m not sure how long ago because all the days are the same – there was a video circulating on Facebook .  It showed at least a hundred chickens all running for their lives and in every direction.  The caption read “This is us when they finally let us back out”.

At the time the idea of stampeding through the door and going all the places we hadn’t been able to go for ages seemed like a reasonable reaction to freedom.  Of course we’d all dive for that door.

Although I can’t put a date on it I do know that it is far enough back that yes, we were in lockdown, but it was early days.  We were just getting our heads around the word pandemic.  Terms like ‘sheltering in place’ and ‘stay at home orders’ surfaced in news stories from all over the world.  Anyone on holiday out of the country was advised to head for home and then self quarantine for two weeks when they got there.  In the beginning these orders and restrictions – although we complied – seemed more like we were humoring the authorities.  In theory we understood what an epidemic was, but in practice because it had never happened to us before, it didn’t feel 100% real.

But the news stories grew.  They grew bigger.  They grew scarier.  They changed from ‘far away’ to ‘in our own back yard’.

All of a sudden, with every country on the planet in the same jeopardy at the same time there weren’t enough resources to fight this thing.  We learned what having COVID-19 does to a human body.  We learned that patients needed something called ventilators and there weren’t enough of them anywhere to meet the demand.  We learned the acronym PPE, and learned that this, as well, was going to be needed in the millions to keep our healthcare workers from contracting and dying from this disease they were fighting.  We learned that our government was so serious about us staying home that they were dishing out money to keep us there.  We learned death counts in Italy were staggering.  We were told that this maelstrom was on its way to us.  It was just a matter of time; a little bit of time.

There has been a reset in our understanding of how our world works.  Obviously doctors and nurses are important at a time such as this, but by themselves they would have been powerless.  It turns out that ‘frontline workers’ and ‘essential workers’ carry the whole country on their shoulders with their cleaning, sanitizing, growing and delivering food, processing meat, running transit, and working in grocery stores, quite often do this vital work for as close to minimum wage as we can keep them.  That is something that needs to be fixed.

But over this time of confinement and contemplation we have had a bit of a personal reset, as well.

I have another chicken story to tell you. 

Our daughter and her family make their home on an acreage.  There are plans someday to have larger animals but at the moment she just keeps chickens for their farm fresh eggs.  This spring her egg laying hens were showing their age so she decided to increase her flock by buying a bunch of year old layers from a large egg farm that was rotating to younger, more productive birds themselves.

Now, one would think that these new birds of hers – recently sprung from their production quota, sterile environment, factory farm existence - would be like the chickens in the video I mentioned earlier, but that is not what is happening.

They are wary of everything.  They are not sure about the soft straw to walk or sleep on.  They are suspicious of all this room to walk around in.  And that little door that leads to the bright light and moving air - well, that can’t be trusted at all!  Gathering eggs is an exercise in not tripping over the birds that flock around her feet.

Who would have thought back when we began this isolation thing that we wouldn’t go roaring back outside at the first chance?  But as of this week the door has been cracked open a bit and no one is rushing for the exit.  Yes, we all need haircuts and long to visit our friends in person, but we are not so sure that it’s safe yet.  We’ve watched the interviews with survivors, we’ve been shocked by the numbers of dead, we’ve seen the refrigerator trucks parked outside hospitals.  We want no part of that.

This pun is so bad and so good at the same time ... but I think we are just a bunch of chickens.  Smart chickens.

Jesse says that a few of them are starting to poke their heads out and take a look around.  That sounds about right.

MINUTE TO MINUTE

5:52 am -  My eyes open and I spend some time trying to guess what time it is.  With the sun getting up just a little earlier every day this is a bit of a challenge.  Challenge is good; might be the only one that happens all day.  I also take a minute to ponder why my jaw is sore.  Well, actually, I know it’s sore because I clench my teeth in my sleep.  The puzzle is why?  Was it the dream I was having about shopping for curtains, the fact that it isn’t warm or dry enough to garden yet, or that I made the mistake of watching Donald Trump on the news before I went to bed?

Oh well, whatever it was, coffee will fix it.  Coffee fixes nearly everything first thing in the morning.

7:02 am -  Breakfast is eaten,I have a second mug of brain juice on the go, and Facebook presents me with my memories of this day for as far back as I’ve been a member of their club.  For this past month of Covid-19 isolation almost all of my memories have been of somewhere else.  Apparently this is when we travel.  Two trips to Australia, a stay in China, Mexican beaches, grandkids in North Bay and Wainwright, family in Calgary and a really fun time in Sedona, Arizona.  Sigh.  

8:16 am -  I wrestle with the decision of whether to stay in my pyjamas or change into my sweatpants and t-shirt ensemble.  The daytime clothes win out as I will likely take the dog for a walk in the afternoon.  The chances of anyone seeing me are pretty low during this time of low traffic, but who wants to be known as ‘that crazy lady who wears pjs to walk her dog’?

10:12 am -  Should I pencil in a phone call so that I ‘stay connected’ or vacuum dog hair?  Decisions, decisions.

11:11 am -  Menu planning!  My favourite!  But it does occupy a fair bit of time, and time is something I have a lot of these days.  Maybe I should get all fancy and try out new recipes?  I do a brief consult with my Creativity and Ambition Department ...  Nope.  Apparently I haven’t reached that level of crazy yet.  Got to save something for next week.

1:06 pm -  Lunch is over.  We’ve caught up on the local news.  No new cases of ‘the Covid’ in the province; this presents the double edged sword of “Yay! We’re doing great!” and “It’s imperative that we continue to isolate.”  Good news and bad news in the same breath.

Now, what to do with the rest of the day?  The dog has me under intense surveillance.  Does he actually think I would go for a walk without him?  He’s the only reason I go for walks!  I have also promised to make someone a batch of raisin oatmeal cookies ... pretty heavy schedule for a Wednesday!

3:47 pm -  A two mile walk takes 38 minutes when I put some effort into it.  These days it takes more like 51 minutes.  And then we spent some togetherness time on the deck trying to get ahead on this shedding thing the dog is into these days.  He is probably 2 pounds lighter, all the little birds for miles around have ample soft, fluffy material for nest building, and he still leaves a trail of husky fluff everywhere he goes.  Vacuum session #2 is scheduled in while the potatoes are boiling for supper – proof I haven’t lost my ability for multi-tasking, thank goodness.  It may come in handy again some day.

6:56 pm -  The evening meal is behind us once more.  There was even dessert.  That’s getting to be standard these days.  Lord help us when they finally open the gates and let us all out again.  Also, the chips and popcorn are not helping.  I finish the dishes and almost instantly find myself rummaging through the snack cupboard.  There is a serious possibility that they will have to widen the gate or we will never make it out of this pasture we’re in.

8:22 pm -  A good evening is spent texting with a friend and swapping the funniest memes we’ve seen all day.  I’m also a puzzle addict so I regularly run my iPad battery down doing puzzles.  And then there’s always my self-destructive penchant for trying to keep up with world affairs.  Typically I do all three at once. 

On Fridays I allow myself a glass of wine to celebrate having made it through another week.

9:43 pm -  The day is officially over, although it’s a tricky thing to convince my brain of this.  In an effort to steer it toward dreamland I go over what I did today, or what I plan for tomorrow; it’s pretty hard to tell the difference these days. 

Maybe I’ll end up back in that dream about shopping for curtains.  I wonder: do I really need curtains?  Or is it that I just want to go shopping ....

AS TIME GOES BY

Well, here we are, day 384 of house arrest.

No, wait a minute, that can’t be right.

No, no, no, make that HOUR 384 of house arrest!  You’ll have to forgive me.  I’ve never been any good at that ‘feels like’ conversion math they use for wind chill.

Anyway, it’s been a long time.

Long enough, in fact for me to have gotten all philosophical about this situation we find ourselves in: this being confined with another human being in a comfortable home with no worries of running out of food or toilet paper.  One would think that being as I had personally chosen this particular human years ago and that the home is my own, things should be going along just hunky-dorry.  If success is measured in the fact that we are both still alive and talking to each other, then yes, this is the epitome of hunky-dorry.

The success of our mutually happy co-habitation is that he does a lot of his habitation out in his shop or up on the pasture cutting wood for future shop heating use.  He is part artist, part inventor, and part mechanic and I am his cheering section.  As long as he’s out in his shop I will cheer on any job he’s doing.  Sometimes the dog goes with him.  This is even better.

Meanwhile, I wander the house remembering the plans I had last week when it was still spring.  I had dragged flower bulbs out of cold storage and rejoiced at the sight of sprouts – proof that the future would hold flowers.  I even sorted things out and prepared a more stable growing environment for these treasures just to have Mother Nature throw another snowball at us, sadistic dame that she is.  I think it’s because I dared to hang laundry out on the line last week; I should have known better.  She always has to have the last word.

This morning, having finished vacuuming the brick wall in my kitchen and letting the dog in and out six more times, I decided that my next big project would be a manicure. 

Usually doing my nails involves a pair of clippers.  Because, normally, I’m not into spending a lot of time on such a mundane task.   COVID-19 has changed all that, though.  Expeditious Jocelyn is so last March.  Now I’m all about savouring the moment.  Why take three minutes to do something that you can stretch out to a full seventeen?  I filed my nails.  They are all nicely rounded and uniform.  It’s really a pity I have nowhere to go and show them off, but that wasn’t the point.  The point was to occupy myself, to engage in self care, to blend artistry and exercise.

Counting the three minutes it took to find an emery board, I used up one third of an hour.  So you know -  win/win.

By that time the dog was long overdue to be let back inside so I picked up where I had left off, and went on with my life.  I really am getting to the point where I need a haircut.  That’s a little scary.

So now I have reached the quandary of what to do with this, hours 384 to 408, of self imprisonment.  Vacuuming?  Thank goodness the dog is spring shedding so that’s a twice daily job.  Cleaning out the fridge?  Well, it’s not the May long weekend yet, but I suppose I could give it a whirl.  Likewise washing the windows.   I was asked if I was going to sew up some cloth face masks – mildly interested in this job I went to check out my sewing supplies ... the fabric was no problem but apparently a person should be hoarding elastic too.

Let’s see ... finish that novel?  Go out and stare at the ground willing my tulips to come up?  Apply for my pension before they run out of money?

Try not to think about when 384 days doesn’t need any conversion math.

 

KEEPING BUSY

For all those people who have put off big jobs for ages, telling yourselves that “if you ever have time, you will get right to it”: how’s that working out for you?

Have you discovered it wasn’t the lack of time that was holding you back?  But, more like the lack of ambition?

And, for those of you that have buckled under the pressure to do something with your COVID crisis time, and now find yourselves knee deep in twenty odd years of keepsakes and your kids’ entire 12 years of scholastic artwork, are you truly glad to be where you are?

Have you binge watched everything you can think of?  Twice?

Are there any books in your possession worth reading again?

Do you need a hair cut?  How hard could that be ... really? 

Do you know how to sew?  Do you have a sewing machine?  Could you find it under the Christmas decoration boxes?  If you have said ‘yes’ to any of these questions, they need face masks out there on the front lines. 

Do you find yourself scrolling through Facebook over and over again, looking for conversation, even if it’s only trading memes?

Do you even know what day it is?

Personally, at this house, today is the day after I made the carrot cake with cream cheese icing and three days after I made the lace cookies.  Last week it was three dozen buns and a few days before that it was a batch of pies and a couple dozen butter tarts.  Today, out of self preservation, I have a roast beef in the oven so there’s no room to cook anything else.  I started out treating this period of isolation like a gift of ‘every day is casual day!’ and revelled in the slouchy comfort of sweat pants.  If I don’t manage to squelch this urge to bake soon sweat pants are going to be my only option.

We are trying to keep occupied though. 

We heat the shop during the winter with a wood burning stove so the resident lumberjack has been going up to the pasture to fell and pile trees for future use.  He tells me that his supply is three years ahead of his demand so far, but as long as he’s not in the house driving me crazy, I’m fine with that.  Besides, in this crazy world, who knows if we won’t need to be heating the house with wood down the road? 

Also, with all that fresh air and exercise, he comes home with a big appetite; all the better to use up all this calorie laden baking I’ve been inspired to do.  It’s a win/win situation.

This feeling of limbo is a strange one, isn’t it?  We prairie people are used to weathering storms.  We are a tough and resilient breed.  But our storms, though they can be very powerful, are also fairly quick.  We prepare, we hunker down, we ride it out, and then the sun comes back out.  This time around we are being told the sun is going to be a long time in the coming.

There’s no adrenalin rush from the wind of a tornado, there’s no measurable dimension of how deep the snow banks are, there’s no radar map to see where we could escape the storm if we wanted to get away.  There is just a plea to stay at home to stop the spread of an invisible and deadly enemy.

It leaves us feeling like we should be doing ‘something’, but ‘nothing’ is what we are required to do.

And so I find myself trying to curb my fetish to bake ... or to cut my own hair.

Heaven knows I’m going to have a hard enough integrating back into society at 300 pounds.  I don’t need a bad hair cut too.

THIS IS IN OUR (VERY CLEAN) HANDS

There’s nothing like a period of ‘sheltering in place’ to reveal just how ‘sheltered’ a person’s life already is.  As far as I can tell zero things have changed for us.  We’re retired and live out on a farm.  Our closest neighbor is a mile away; that’s a lot of social distance.  I go to town for groceries – just like I always do – well, except that the store is out of things I need.  It’s not the store’s fault.  People are crazy. 

Remember, a million years ago when we started hearing about this new virus China was having a problem with?  Remember how amazed we were with the news that they slapped up a 1000 bed hospital in less than a week, but it was the speed that impressed us, not the need.

Next, it became a story about people stranded on cruise ships because of this virus – the ships not allowed to dock, the people not allowed to disembark? Still, this was happening on the other side of the planet – it was interesting and only a little worrying if we knew folks who were traveling.

Then, at what should have been no surprise to any of us, the novel corona virus made landfall on North American shores.  By this time it had a name – COVID-19 – and the scientist’s voices were starting to get loud enough for us to begin to pay attention.  Daily, incrementally, the public service announcements stepped up their urgency, the warnings probably being dispensed in stages so as not to cause panic.  The voices of the announcers and political leaders are steady and measured but there are dark rings under their eyes and they look like they aren’t getting a whole lot of sleep.

All of a sudden the school year was over, hockey season was over, baseball will not be starting, the Olympics are off for 2020.

And here we are: sheltering place.

There’s that question you hear from time to time:  If you could have a conversation with anyone, who would you choose?

As of this week I am intrigued with how the people of 1918 weathered the Spanish Influenza.  Oh sure, I can read all sorts of history about where it came from, how it spread, how many people died, and how it resurfaced in 1920 for a second round, but that information doesn’t cover how the everyday people coped with the fear, the rumors, and the disease itself.  Humans being humans and deadly disease being deadly disease, likely we have a lot in common with our great grandparents.  What could they teach us about what the coming year will be like if we could only talk to them?

Without the wisdom of people who actually lived through a pandemic such as we are facing now I guess our only choice is to cope on our own. 

The word ‘humanity’ is generally used when we are describing virtues such as generosity, altruism, and selflessness – the good side of being human.  But Webster’s Dictionary defines ‘humanity’ merely as ‘the quality or state of being human’; not necessarily the same thing at all.  Humans can be very frail things when they feel their lives are in jeopardy.  For some it brings out the best in them, for a few it uncovers the worst.  Both are very human.

From what I’ve come to learn about this virus, we are in it for the long haul.  No amount of dissatisfaction with being cooped up inside, no disappointment of no school or sports or socializing with friends is going to change the fact that if we don’t obey the stay home orders, the quarantine will only have to go on longer.  Neither does our frustration at having our lives on hold make the slightest bit of difference to a virus.  As long as we spread it around it will continue to infect and kill people.

The bottom line is that we humans are the key.  We can be kind to each other and take care of each other.  We can learn from this experience so to be better prepared for the next time.  And most important and immediate of all, we can stop the spread in its tracks.  The virus can go nowhere without us to carry it.

So, shelter in place – and while you’re at it, write a diary of how you feel and what you did with your days of isolation.  Someone will want to read them some day.

 

THE LIFE YOU SAVE ....

I’ve seen lots of memes on Facebook where the person posting them had never realized how inactive their social life was until they were put into this new reality of self isolation and found that almost nothing changed.  I have to confess, I am one of those.

We are supposed to curtail all congregating in groups – pretty easy for people who are lucky to manage a card game with neighbours once a year and haven’t been to a movie for six or seven years.  Our most common restaurant meal is a takeout pizza.  The most social thing I do is belong to the local Tourism Board and we meet once a month – except on the months that we don’t need to.  The only difference this COVID quarantine has made for me is that now I’m living my usual life for a purpose.

I don’t mean to make light of this.  This is serious stuff.  It is an actual life or death situation, and regardless of your age and pre-existing health conditions, with as many deaths as are being reported when we have barely set foot into what is going to be an prolonged period of catastrophe, the deceased are not all elderly with heart conditions.  There are doctors and nurses gone in the prime of their lives, there are children gasping for air in hospital beds.  There are just plain, regular people who couldn’t fight off a viral pneumonia.  Listen to what the medical and scientific experts are telling you – the life you save may be your own.

 I realize that we are extremely lucky to live where we live ... seven miles from town and a mile from our nearest neighbour.  Not that the virus couldn’t make it here – I do have to go buy groceries and I have family responsibilities that can’t be put off.  Plus, I had absolutely no idea of how many times I touched my face or rubbed my eyes until it became a forbidden practice.  I have tried to change my ways, and there’s a whole lot more washing going on around here these days.

There is also a whole lot more news watching going on as well.  It’s hard to find a balance between making ourselves aware of what we need to know and scaring the heck out of us just before bedtime.  Luckily I am accustomed to spending the hours between 1:45 and 4:47 solving the world’s problems, anyway.  I wish I could say it was refreshing to have a new one to deal with, but no, I still have lots of work to do on climate change ...

I am beyond thankful that the weather is supposed to warm up this week.  I will be getting out and walking again.  The dog (although he is unaware at this time how his walking fortunes are about to improve) is going to be overjoyed.  Heck, we might make it four miles instead of two!  I’ve got nothing but time!

And, as spring is actually here I will be shifting into gardening mode too ... outside time, fresh air, something to do.  All these things I look forward to every year but 2020 has upped the ante by about 500%.  I can’t imagine families living in city apartments. With the space and seclusion we enjoy out here in the boonies I feel like I’m the richest woman on the planet right now.

I also fear being nothing but a Facebook meme cliché by the time we emerge from this viral war.  You know the meme I’m talking about: the one where you start out slim, trim, and fit and end up a rolling butterball turkey?  Well, I made five pies and four dozen butter tarts today.

Better make that a six mile walk every day, Turbo!

HERE’S HOPING THIS WILL ALL BE FUNNY SOMEDAY

I confess: I do buy my toilet paper in the biggest package that Costco offers.  That would be a case of 24 rolls.  The last time I was there – I think it was in November- I did indeed make such a purchase.  Amid all this toilet paper madness I just went and checked our supply; we still half of that left.  I guess two people don’t use all that much toilet paper.  I will probably need to buy more – like, in July.

I hear that there are people – well, scalpers, really – selling bottles of hand sanitizer for over $100.00 a bottle.  Maybe I should get in on that and sell the little purse sized bottles I’ve got kicking around the place for $50.00?  I hate the stuff.  I would rather wash my hands with soap and water any day. 

Another commodity in demand, I hear, is canned beans.  Okay, I understand.  We all consider this to be a staple food; a nutritious emergency meal needing only a can opener and a spoon to access it, and it can be enjoyed both hot and cold.  Is it the ‘emergency’ feature of beans that has people buying whole cases?  Do they think that the coronavirus is going to infect our power grid too?  That we won’t be able to cook anything?  That their chances of getting sick of beans isn’t every bit as high contracting COVID-19 ?  It really made me smile to hear that the bags of dry beans were also disappearing from store shelves.  Really?  How many people actually know how to turn those little pellets into food, anyway? 

“May you live in interesting times.”

This is said to be a Chinese curse – not the disease and resulting worldwide pandemic, but the actual saying  ‘may you live in interesting times’.  Oh the irony of it all!  These very interesting times are compliments of a virus that first showed up in China: just one more interesting fact to ponder as the days go by and we continually check for news updates.

It’s not like we haven’t been warned repeatedly that we were due a significant infection.  Scientists have been predicting and preparing for this exact scenario for decades, and have had test runs with SARS and MERS and H1N1.  They’ve seen how some diseases are more lethal and some are more infectious.  I remember reading that the most serious problem to deal with is the ease and speed of infection that a disease can manage, the worst case scenario being when a person is infectious before he or she knows they are sick.  That is COVID-19’s secret power; that is why its rate of spread is so alarming.

Its other super power has been that our human response to it has been underwhelming until this past week. 

At the global level the World Health Organization has been holding regular press conferences to alert governments of the disease’s progress. 

At the individual country level there have been differing attitudes as to how seriously to take the threat – some have fared better than others.  Italy is in real trouble and many others are only a week behind. 

At the ordinary people level we have the good ones who are self isolating without even being asked, and the ridiculous ones who are hoarding more toilet paper than they will ever use.

It remains to be seen how this will play out.  It is possible that cancelling all sports games and music concerts is going over the top.  Maybe shutting down schools is unnecessary.  Maybe travel bans are crazy. 

But, won’t it be nice to sit around with all of our loved ones in five years and laugh about how we over reacted? 

Then again, won’t it be just nice to sit around with all of our loved ones in five years and discuss how much we learned from our fight with COVID-19? 

Some of us still won’t be out of toilet paper.