quarantine

Chocolate Lambs – ND # 127

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Chocolate Lambs – Photo: L. Weikel

Chocolate Lambs

This will be a quick pre-Easter post. I couldn’t believe my eyes the other day when I saw these chocolate lambs (with their tails dipped in white chocolate!) gamboling in the field behind our house. Naturally, I stopped my car and rolled down the window to take their photo – and couldn’t believe my eyes when they both immediately stopped what they were doing and turned to look at me. I don’t know what it surprised me so much, but it did.

It sure looks like these two could be identical twins. They couldn’t be cuter. And the two donkeys that share the field with them agree wholeheartedly, braying their approval.

Just another sign of the arrival of spring. Babies. Lambie-kins. Heck, I even saw sparrows getting frisky today underneath our feeders. Actually, the male snuck up behind the female and made her jump three feet in the air! Boy, did she give him a beak lashing.

Quick Pacha and Brutus Update

We’re all feeling the torture of not being able to play outside together. One has to stay inside while the other gets to frisk about outside. It’s especially torturous now that this warm weather has arrived. I wish I were quicker on the draw with my phone camera. Watching the pups try to catch bugs is simply adorable.

We’re all eagerly awaiting the end of this quarantine. The bright side to this, though, is that it does give Karl and me special one-on-one time with each pup that we rarely enjoy.

In the end, this ‘heat’ season may be bringing us all closer.

One thing I am not enjoying is the onset of tick season. Ugh. I just found two crawling on me as I wrote this post. Bleccch. I’m sure this warm weather is causing a tsunami of eggs to hatch. Ugh. Just the thought makes me shudder…

Just too cute – Photo: L. Weikel

(T+127)

Sacrifice – Day 621

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CSA Flowers – Photo: L. Weikel

Sacrifice

So far, I’ve been extraordinarily lucky not to have been asked to sacrifice a great deal as a result of the pandemic.

I’m grateful that no one in my family has been hit with the virus (yet), although I have had a few friends contract it. Thankfully, there have been no hospitalizations (yet).

Part of the ‘luck’ I feel Karl and I are experiencing is a direct result of our ability to aggressively keep to ourselves. Both of us are able to continue our work from home. Yes, even my work – which I suppose might be an interesting blog post in itself.

A key to a lot of that aggressive isolation is continuing the protocols we began back in March, even though our state began ‘opening up,’ albeit carefully, a few weeks ago.

Discovering What’s Necessary

Karl and I discovered in those early months of the pandemic that we really don’t need to run around anywhere near as much as we used to. Indeed, we’ve begun admitting to ourselves and each other that a not insubstantial portion of our hopping in the car was related to procrastination.

Needless to say, we’ve both stealthily acquired and honed a few new procrastination techniques – but I can confidently assure you, they do not involve our cars. So that’s a win/win in my book.

We’ve also realized just how little we actually need of anything other than food. And books. Of course, how could I forget books.

A Revelation

So it was a revelation to me today to witness just how thrown I was by my decision not to travel to Connecticut to participate in my eldest sister’s 80th birthday.

Damn. 80. That just doesn’t seem possible. If you were to meet her, you’d never think she was 80. She still works, even, twice a week, in a museum gift shop. And I’m grateful she can do that – I have no doubt it keeps her sharp and provides for essential human contact which keeps her young at heart, in mind and spirit.

Which leads me to my feeling of having sacrificed today in a meaningful way. It’s not been a sacrifice for me to ‘hard quarantine.’ It’s been annoying at times, and inconvenient. But having to actively say ‘no’ to myself and restrain myself from jumping in the car and heading north to Connecticut to celebrate Jane’s huge milestone was huge for me. And weighed heavily on my heart.

A Strategy

Indeed, I scheduled a session with a client for this afternoon precisely because I knew I’d be tempted at the last minute to ‘be there’ for her – and to see her kids, my nieces and nephews. But I knew I wouldn’t cancel with a client; that’s sacred. And I felt the wisdom of the foresight of that strategy, believe me. Instead of licking my wounds and second-guessing myself, or worse – feeling sorry for myself – I focused on the needs of my client.

Another win/win.

Saying ‘no’ to myself and refusing to allow myself to go to Jane’s party felt like a true sacrifice. I did it, though, because I want Jane to live to see more birthdays in her 80s (and beyond, Goddess willing). And since who knows whether Karl and I might be asymptomatic carriers, I could not and would not risk attending. And that goes for my nieces and nephews and their kids.

I want our family’s clean record to remain unbroken. And for that, I was willing to sacrifice.

Love you, Jane. Happy birthday!

Photo: L. Weikel

(T-490)

A Second, Scarier, Quarantine – Day 559

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Storm Clouds, Portal of Blue – Photo: L. Weikel

A Second, Scarier, Quarantine

Only one short year ago, I wrote about the Spotted Lantern Fly (SLF), an invasive species that is decimating forests in Pennsylvania and spreading into other states as well. In that post, I discussed the quarantine our state is under and the efforts being made to eradicate this pest. But what I found most stunning when I re-read that post a few minutes ago was my use of the word quarantine – and the weird reality of this second, scarier, quarantine we find ourselves in.

My discussion of the need for us to work together to keep the SLF from spreading seems almost sweetly naïve. I was entreating us all to work together to kill off a bug with no natural predators in order to protect our forests. And of course, I assumed we would.

Surely we would work together to fight against the spread of a ‘bug’ with no natural predators for the good of us all. Right?

Kick Off Summer Right

I don’t need to tell anyone reading this post that Memorial Day Weekend 2020 is on track to be one of the strangest any of us have experienced in our lifetimes. As a direct result of our behavior, it could very well turn out to be potentially the deadliest of holiday weekends as well.

Only time will tell if that relates to humans as well as Spotted Lantern Flies.

I’d prefer to think this is a worse time for SLFs than my fellow two-leggeds, but it will take a lot of work to make it so. That’s especially true if humans feel the need to be petulant and wilful. Especially if we demand that nothing in our lives change in order to keep each other and ourselves healthy and ‘bug-free.’

Do Our Part

There are two ways we can do our part to make things worse for Spotted Lantern Flies than ourselves and our fellow humans.

The first is to make a point to be vigilant when outside, as surely all of us will be this weekend – and throughout the summer – to be on the lookout for the bug we can see: the Spotted Lantern Fly.

Here is a great article I read today encouraging all of us to take up the cause I advocated last year.  As I said then, and as I reiterate now, it takes all of us working together to beat this scourge.

Of course, the second way we can make sure this summer is worse for the SLF than for us humans is to kill (or at least minimize the spread) of the bug we can’t see. We need to use our heads. Not be dumb. The research is out there; it shows just how virulently the Coronavirus spreads through water droplets and aerosol particles that come out of our mouths and noses through coughing, laughing, talking, and singing.

Wear a mask when out in public. Stay away (by at least six feet) from people generally  – but especially from people who don’t care enough about anyone but themselves to wear a mask.

This isn’t a case of freedom. Or liberty. Requiring people to wear masks when it is scientifically proven that masks can prevent up to 80% of the spread of Covid-19 is a simple matter of public health and welfare. The right to live in safety from the spread of a highly communicable disease (that can be carried by people who have no symptoms and may not even know they have it) ‘trumps’ the so-called ‘infringement’ on the right of anyone to refuse to wear a mask.

The rights are not equal. You do not have the right to kill me. Or my friends. Or my relatives. Or even those I may not like or do not know.

Kill the Bugs – Not Each Other

While I’m not a big fan of killing anything, truth be told, I would much prefer we all focus our attention on kicking the need for quarantines of any kind. Let’s kill those Spotted Lantern Flies. (Here’s another link to good info on this.) Let’s also kill the spread of the Coronavirus. Every time we wear a mask we do our part to starve the beast.

Call me naïve, but I do think we can work together to save us all. I’m not liking this second, scarier, quarantine. But let’s hope I’m not writing about a third quarantine next year at this time.

(T-552)