Everything I wanted to say here… I said in an email already…So I’m just gonna cut and paste it here LOL Yep- I’m that lazy…
I don’t really know how things are out there either, I know the rec center is open again, and the library… I think over the next week we will see even more changes. I am surprisingly doing great since the zinc incident…. I never realized over the last year how much my face had changed as that jaw and cheek bone (not to mention spine) were under duress…. as the bone is growing back in thanks to the graft that I was positive wouldn’t work on me… my face is changing dramatically – at first I thought it was swelling… but i could feel it in my cheek bones…. and someone on a conference call online commented on it that could see me in my webcam…. so I knew it wasn’t in my head… so I went through some photos… and found photos of myself a year ago….
I ran into an old friend and took a selfie with him, look at my teeth first off… just one year ago… full and white… and my cheekbones high Then looked at one of my in february…. drinking tigers eye from a bottle (jokingly) during legislation
obviously by this point I was hiding my teeth at work… but you can tell anyways… my cheeks are completely hollow and goneso slowly I guess I didn’t notice…. but the regrowth back so fast I felt like I didn’t look like myself… however… pictures prove… I look exactly like myself again… I kinda like that!Here I am this morning! Look! Cheeks!
The other thing I’ve been up too when im not working – is I made this years fairy city video- I don’t know if I told you I make a video that just highlights it all… for my memories… Here I am attaching this years and last years links. its been an interesting fairy season to say the least.
my email to Christine while shes been in quarantine at an airbnb
I hate the phrase… yet you cannot hear a news story with out it… sometimes it feels like people are trying to find a way to work it into a sentence I swear… but then yesterday I did a thing… and I had no other phrase to use as I tossed and turned all night long trying to make sense of things in my head.
Let me start this story by saying this… Sewing is against my religion
But… The New Normal… sigh
I bloodied a lot of fingersMy youngest grandchild’s and my matching masksI made one for all of my kids.and distance delivered… cause the new normal 🙁 Literally threw them from my car like I had a T shirt gun or I was Trump with paper towels.
it took me hours… half of them didn’t fit… I was still proud. I take a LOT of pictures… I mean a LOT. I love them… and I love to finish an adventure and then flip through them… and when I got home and laid on the couch… again… cause thats the new normal… I notice something in the photos…
Their eyes… Specifically my girls… but then looking closely… the boys as well.
Their eyes reminded me of their reaction…. Two weeks ago my house donned masks for the first time… we made masks (no sew version) as the CDC recommended and put them on..
We did not know how to make them… they were uncomfortable… but we did it… it was an exercise in feeling less helpless… we weren’t sure how to even put them on
We drew them on our favorite disney characters… used hoodies in stead…
Finally wore them when we went out for Easter Window coloring/Jellybean delivery
But what I didn’t realize is that these littles… were so little… that this new normal… is normal for them… and they were so happy to get masks… and didn’t even question having to wear them… they donned them instantly… in fact… they looked terrified to not have them on once they had them. The eyes of my Granddaughter haunted me all evening afterwards… and I reached out to a friend… and her mother to talk about it… because my heart was sick… and sad… I didn’t want them to feel that way.
They told me “Its not scary to them… Its kind of cool and fun to wear them… plus their Grandma made it for them… which makes it even better.” Something about that rang true to me… They weren’t scared… it was more about my sadness than theirs… even if their eyes are haunted. They aren’t haunted by the masks… they’re haunted by the panic in us. They are just trying to do anything to make that better.
Knowing I hadn’t scared them didn’t make me feel much better… I am still sad… but it did make me realize we have to do this… we can do this. I need those kids… and myself to be okay… I need to wrap my arms around them again… and cover their faces in kisses… I need to get close enough to tell them I love them… instead of using sign language through windows. This new normal is something I have to acclimate to… so we can get there.
As the world is losing their minds… protesting in large numbers… the stay at home orders… that aren’t even being enforced… but highlighted by right wing nut jobs (Our president specifically) I am back in my home… tucked into my couch desk… typing this taking is solace in the only thing I can. Love. I love them so much…. Love and the fact that this too shall pass… it is what it is.
One day soon I will make those haunted eyes lighten with laughter and excitement again… one day soon I will hold them… even if it is with masks on and we wash our hands after… and we don’t touch our faces… Soon.
“It’ll be okay, Mom” – thats what tall child told me. Today I am going to believe her.
The Sun is a daily reminder, that even after the darkest night… we will rise and shine again.
Soooo This was not on my Bingo Card… I’ve got plague… zombies… volcano … nope… no raccoon in the water supply…. anyone ? Anyone?
Surgeon general has corona virus warning: ‘This week, it’s going to get bad’
The disease is spreading, the surgeon general said, because many people are not following the guidance to stay at home. As the preacher who went to Mardi Gras?? (Do preachers do that for real?) Saying we were over reacting…dies from the virus
More so… This Virus is pointing out the inequality… We must flatten the curve… but we must also flatten inequality in health care… the economy… the level of Privilege… access to nutritious food and overall quality of life… It is the only way we can truly emerge from this tragedy with a semblance of hope for the future. People are dying… just dying everywhere.
and I hear the privileged just say… they want to go back to normal… that they are worried about the economy…. people are dying!!!!
I have my library friend in a motel… shes been there four weeks… I cannot afford to keep her there… I do not know what to do… When you are living in a shelter or crowded buildings with multiple family members… or on the street… you don’t have the luxury to socially distance… When you don’t have the luxury to work from home… you can’t avoid getting on a bus or other forms of public transportation to go to work… Ditto when you can’t afford your own car… can’t afford an Uber ride. It’s easy to socially distance in the suburbs or in affluent neighborhoods… but it becomes nearly impossible in crowded urban areas and in lower-income neighborhoods.
Her name is Christine… I Love Her… I do not yet know what to do… we have covered one more week in the Hotel… I spoke to her last night… she is well… but I can feel her string tightening… and it is all she is hanging on by..
How can I keep her alive??
Inequality… Lets talk about the privilege of being able to wear a non-medical mask in public… that is a racial thing… do not make me remind you about my friend in a hoodie… or my other friend who had been raised NOT TO RUN to the car regardless of the weather… how is this mask thing going to work out… I NEED YOU TO BE CONSCIENTIOUS in your judgments and witnessing.
Hang in there… hunker down but keep fighting… Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much… And… Together we will get through this….
I HAVE NOT LOST HOPE!
I am alive… definitely kicking… I realized something through all this Lupus prepared me for this!This life you are all adjusting too… has been my life for 3 years… Today I fast… with the world…. lots of it anyways… out of solidarity and love of my family… and neighbors… Im an agnostic… what I do believe in is Love… Kindness… and Hope is my religion. Im in good spirits… Just collecting my history… my story…
This week in pictures… so I never forget what the US Surgeon General said would be the saddest week of our lives looked like.
I will try to come here later today and put some thoughts and feelings to these photos… but right now I am emotionally drained from blogging about my tooth.
At the end of December… 34-year-old ophthalmologist Dr Li Wenliang tried to send a message to other medics warning them about a new virus in Wuhan, in China’s Hubei Province.
He was later visited by the police accused of scaremongering and subsequently died of coronavirus after treating patients. – Lets be honest Trump would’ve done the same thing here… But it happen to be there… and Trump called it the Chinese Virus… Sparking racial attacks here in america … sigh
On 3 January we read our first news report about a “mystery virus” in Wuhan. At the time… 44 cases had been confirmed… 11 of which were considered severe. There had been no deaths yet, but many feared we would see a repeat of the 2003 Sars outbreak that killed 774 people. By 18 January the confirmed number of cases had risen to around 60 – but experts estimated the real figure was closer to 1,700.
Anonymous figured about double that.
Just two days later… as millions of people prepared to travel for the lunar new year… the number of cases more than tripled to more than 200 and the virus was detected in Beijing,…Shanghai and Shenzhen.
On 23 January… Wuhan went into lockdown. There was video shown of them literally welding people into their homes… At this point… 18 people had died – 17 in Hubei, and one in Beijing – and 570 others had been infected, including in Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, South Korea and the United States.
Again, Anonymous said this was grossly under reported.
Dr Li Wenliang died on 6 February.
January 30th – 80-year-old tourist died in France – Europe’s first coronavirus death. The virus appeared in Iran five days later… with two people who died within hours of their diagnosis being announced. Iran would later become a hotspot for the virus.
Italy saw a major surge in cases on 23 February, and 10 towns in Lombardy went into lockdown. On 10 March the lockdown was extended to the whole of Italy. Videos began to surface of the empty streets with people inside their windowed apartments singing in unison…. sigh
March 12th Governor Herbert (Utah) suggested we start social distancing… and if you are immune compromised to quarantine…. so I did. Danielle still came for a Cancelled Spaghetti dinner… and setting up of fairy city (which was not cancelled)… and an outside version of St. Patricks Day… and then flew home the day before the earthquake… thats another story still for another day.
On 23 March… British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced a three-week lockdown in the UK… Ironically he tested positive for the virus… and continues shaking hands and hugging people. ass-hat.
Three days later… the US officially overtook Chinaas the country hardest-hit by the coronavirus outbreak… after calling it a hoax…. after botching up all the obtaining of tests… and supplies…. with more than 86,000 confirmed cases. By 2 April… Today… this had risen to more than 217,000 – almost double the number of cases in Italy.
World wide? more than one million people worldwide have been infected with the coronavirus. More than 200,000 have recovered. But more than 50,000 people have died. New York is using ice rinks to store bodies… and I will never get used to the fact that you can choose same day burial…. or immediate cremation as your only options for a loved one.
If you call for medical help… for you or a loved one… and the ambulance comes… there is no riding with them… there is no following in your car… there is no visiting… or updates… There is only goodbye for now… and hopefully not forever.
Last night in my tiny suburb of Salt Lake City…. Davis County issued a Lock-down order… beginning at midnight…. It was the 1st of April and it was no joke…. some thought it would be funny to drive around the streets an hour prior to it being a class b misdemeanor to do so… playing the song/alarm from The Purge. I didn’t sleep a wink.
The US accounts for the most cases… Italy the highest death toll.
