Happier New Year

Generally speaking major holidays are a slow time for blogging specifically or for social media generally.  We should all have better things to do.  But ah, 2020, the year that broke all the rules.  As we creep up on a full year of semi imprisonment I guess there's not that much else going on today.  Other than a decidedly non-fond farewell to a stinker of a year.

I did not get on an airplane.  Heck I did not leave the state of Wisconsin.  My usual cycle of teaching and learning was blown up.  No summer robotics programs, no (live) presentations on local history, no tech school or University courses.  Some major elements of post retirement life were swept away.  Their return is uncertain.

I suppose there are other things I did not do that count as good.  I did not, so far as I know, get Covid.  I kept getting offers from the State of Wisconsin to renew my medical license to help with the feared disease apocalypse.  I said "Nah, no thanks".  And I don't see evidence that my help was needed in any case.

If I had put myself back in the front lines I suppose some of the surprisingly good aspects of the year would not have happened.  We got to spend plenty of time with the grand children.  It took discipline with respect to other contacts but it was totally worth it.  They are now 5 and 2.  We got to see some moments that were magical....and ephemeral.  Some things, all the best ones really,  happen once and you have to be there.  

As to the new, replacement hobbies...well they're OK.  Geocaching is fun and a bit of exercise.  Trying to catch multiple species of bizarre fish is the sort of thing that my sense of humor appreciates.  Joining, belatedly, the culture of blaze orange deer hunters is both interesting and tasty.

I've written more than in some years.  Certainly on a wider range of topics.  Detritus of Empire is creeping up on the ten year mark.  It too will evolve and then one day go away.  But today is not that day.  

And so we enter a strange late phase of the pandemic.  The vaccine is now available.  I actually know three people who have gotten it.  For the rest of us the wait drags on.  And an impatient, nervous wait it is.  I don't live in fear of Covid.  But even I am getting more cautious.  It has been a long, drawn out conflict.  The losses have been heavy and the damage to our spirits even worse.  It is rather like 1918 and the approaching end of the Great War.  Nobody wanted to be the last casualty, so on the morning of November 11th you can bet there were damned few soldiers peeking over the parapets.  It would be tragic to die hours before the Armistice, even if it did turn out to be no more than a 20 year reprieve.  Just as it would be tragic to contract Covid and expire just before your circumstances qualified you for vaccine.  

Of course surviving Covid will not make us immortal and none of us should lose track of the important things in life.  But heck, give me a 20 year reprieve and you'll hear no complaints.