Tag: pandemic

Unmasked!

As my more frequent readers may recall, spouse B, daughter T, and I are all participants in the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine trial. The vaccine received emergency use authorization in the United States in December 2020. Pfizer is now unmasking people in the placebo group and offering to make them part of the vaccine group for further study as they plan to follow participants for two years to gather data on long-term efficacy.

Earlier this week, I received a call saying that I was in the placebo group, which B, T, and I had long suspected as they both had side effects after our injections but I did not. I will receive my first injection with the real vaccine in early February, timed to coincide with the end of the waiting period after the shingles vaccine I had this month. I am grateful for the opportunity to receive the vaccine and to contribute to the data which will help keep more people from suffering the worst consequences of COVID and eventually end the pandemic.

While we will still need to mask and distance, I’m hoping that, as I and others around me are vaccinated, I will be able to return to some places that I have not been able to visit. I may, at least occasionally, make a reservation to attend mass on the weekend, something that I always did pre-pandemic but have not done since March 2020. I may visit with friends indoors, which would be nice given that outdoor visits are tricky in the winter. Eventually, we may be able to travel again, although I’m afraid a trip to London will not be possible for some months.

The other piece of good vaccine news from our family is that my 95-year-old father, known here as Paco, has received his second shot of the Pfizer vaccine. In a couple of weeks, he should reach his maximum level of protection. This is particularly important because he is in an assisted living unit, which is considered a higher risk living situation. Presently, visiting is very restricted. T was able to visit him in person for half an hour today in a socially distanced visiting room; earlier this week, I was able to do a window visit, where we could see each other through a window while we spoke by phone. I am hoping that, as residents and staff all receive their vaccinations and as more members of families receive theirs, the state will relax visiting restrictions to allow masked visits into residents’ apartments. We haven’t been able to see Paco’s new place yet and would love to be able to help organize things for him.

In our little corner of upstate New York, we are chipping away at the pandemic, doing what we can to bring it under control. We know, though, that things in the country as a whole will be difficult throughout the winter. We have passed 414,000 deaths in the US with the expectation that we will reach half a million deaths in February. It’s staggering.

I’m hopeful that the Biden administration’s leadership and plans will help us get through this winter with the least amount of damage possible, although we have been warned that things will get worse before they get better. I hope each person will do what they can to help in the effort.

Christmas tree 2020/21

It’s January 12th and our Christmas tree is still up.

We are lucky that fresh-cut Canaan firs are so resilient. It is not shedding needles and is still exuding a lovely scent.

It is still adorned with our usual assortment of ornaments – glass, ceramic, wood, metal, cloth – many of which were gifts or handed down to us or collected on our travels. There are LED light strands, which are great because they don’t use much energy, don’t get hot, and don’t dry out the needles. The angel I made with the help of a friend years ago is perched on top.

Ordinarily, we decorate our tree in mid-December and take it down at Epiphany. This year, we put it up in early December. It was the first time in several years that I actually wanted to decorate the tree, after several stressful years, although I admit that my energy to do so flagged mid-way through, sapped by memories of loss.

Still, it was nice to have it all decorated and glowing near the living room window.

And then, an avalanche of things happened.

Everyone knows about the horrific toll of the coronavirus around the world and particularly in the United States. The single day death toll topped 4,000 deaths for the first time on January 7th. More virulent strains are spreading. The vaccine rollout is too little, too late to tamp the spread for the winter, although it is offering some hope.

Everyone also knows about the precarious and dangerous political situation in the United States. The breach of the US Capitol by insurrectionist followers of DT and the destruction, violence, injury, and death they caused, coupled with the craven complicity/opportunism of dozens of Republican members of Congress, have thrown us into the most dangerous situation of my lifetime. I think the best course would be for both DT and Pence to resign, giving Nancy Pelosi the powers and protection of the presidency for a few days to try to stabilize the government before the January 20th inauguration. I know this is another exercise of my penchant for political fantasy, but I think it is perhaps the least dangerous of the possible paths, given that both Pence’s and Pelosi’s lives were threatened by the mob on January 6th.

While both of those situations are sapping my brainpower and motivation, the biggest factor in not taking down the tree is that I am spending a lot of time in trying to get my father settled into his new unit in assisted living without being able to physically go into the building to tend to things due to COVID restrictions, while dealing with cleaning out his apartment in independent living and handling all the nuts and blots of changing contact information with all the businesses, doctors, insurance, financial institutions, etc. [I have also been dealing with the aftereffects of my second shingles vaccine, which, while not as severe as after the first, are still bothersome.]

I was so proud of what I accomplished yesterday and had hoped to get more done today. Instead, I’ve had to spend most of the day so far on the couch. I can’t even wrap my head around making the string of phone calls waiting for me.

Tomorrow, I’ll need to get back at it, especially with the apartment packing and such. B, T, and I are hoping to have everything cleared out by the end of the long weekend for MLK Day.

The tree?

Maybe we’ll get to it over the weekend, too.

*****
Join us for Linda’s Just Jot It January! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2021/01/12/jusjojan-prompt-the-12th-sing/

what hasn’t changed

The last few years have been challenging for me and my family. As I have written in (many) posts, these personal challenges have been compounded by what is happening in the United States.

As I begin a busy week in caring for my family, the back drop is the horrifying news that United States has passed 20 million confirmed COVID cases with over 352,000 known deaths with COVID. It is immeasurably sad – and infuriating because we could have prevented a large share of these with good public health measures and accessible, timely medical care. There is hope for the coming months with vaccines becoming available and the incoming administration has a good team to improve the national pandemic response.

Unfortunately, the current president and many Congressional Republicans are still trying to prevent the duly elected Joe Biden and Kamala Harris from taking office as president and vice-president on January 20th. Over the weekend, an hour-long recording of a telephone call from the president to the secretary of state of Georgia and his legal counsel was released, in which the president repeatedly pressures and threatens them to change the certified election win of Joe Biden to a win for Trump. On Wednesday, both houses of Congress will meet to count the electoral college votes, which will be 306 for Biden and 232 for Trump. Nevertheless, over a hundred Republican members of the House of Representatives and a dozen Republican senators plan to challenge or vote against acceptance of the count from six states Biden won, including Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. Given that dozens of court cases alleging fraud or procedural problems with the voting system have already been dismissed and the proper certifications by the states have been done, there are no real grounds for the objections and they will be defeated after hours of debate. That so many members of Congress are willing to violate their oath to uphold the Constitution and US law is frightening and disconcerting and does not bode well for passing needed legislation through Congress.

Yes, the change from 2020 to 2021 did not erase any existing problems, but we need to work toward rectifying them and making life better for people, not devolving into lies and blaming others.

*****
Join us for Linda’s Just Jot It January. Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2021/01/04/jusjojan-prompt-the-1st-fingertips/

January first

I’m generally not a big celebrator of New Year’s Eve/Day, looking at it as just the next day rather than a new start. This year does feel a bit different, as I am grateful to have made it through the tumult of 2020 and have hopes for 2021 for improvements in the governance in the US and for vaccine distribution and better public health policy to finally start to tamp down the pandemic by spring.

Still, personal circumstances make it seem less like a new start and more a continuation of existing issues. My dad, known here as Paco, is expecting to move from the rehab unit of his senior community into the assisted living unit next week. I am busy with paperwork and packing to facilitate the move. It’s awkward because, with COVID restrictions in place, family is not allowed into the health care building where the assisted unit is, so we can prepare and pack but can’t help with the actual moving, unpacking, and arranging.

Ordinarily, I would be gearing up for Linda’s Just Jot It January and planning to post every day for the month. I cannot wrap my head around posting every day this January with so much going on, including the fact that I should get my second dose of shingles vaccine this month. The first dose made me sick for a week, so I expect a similar experience with the second dose. I’m not looking forward to that, but I’ve had shingles before and am anxious to do everything I can to avert a repeat occurrence. When I do post in January, I will link to #JusJoJan, but I am giving myself permission to post sporadically rather than consistently.

I am somewhat uncharacteristically struggling with words, both spoken and written. I think I am overwhelmed enough and exhausted enough that my brain can’t settle down to easily arrange my thoughts into cogent language. It’s not good for my blogging or poetry and it’s disconcerting for conversation, especially when I have to have so many phone calls and conversations to get things arranged for Paco’s care. I’m managing, but nowhere near the level I want to be.

I’m asking, once again, for your patience as I slog through this.

I should close now and make myself copy dates and commitments into my 2021 calendar. It’s a dreaded task every year and 2021 is no different in that regard.

On pandemic church attendance

Back in the days of the anti-fracking battle in New York State, I wrote tons of comments to articles in the press. I still occasionally write a comment on a topic of interest. The following is a comment I submitted to an op-ed by Wilton Cardinal Gregory, Archbishop of Washington, DC, in The Washington Post, entitled “Praying apart isn’t the same as praying together. That’s why we sued D.C.” Because the article is behind a paywall, I will synopsize. Cardinal Gregory had sued the city of Washington, DC “to protect the free exercise of religion in the nation’s capital.” There had been a limit of fifty people in religious services, (which was subsequently eased by Mayor Muriel Bowser on December 16th). He pointed out that more than fifty people were allowed in stores and other venues.

My comment:
I am Catholic and someone who spent years in liturgical service as a musician and a liturgy planner. I was consistently attending mass on weekends and holy days, but I have not attended in person mass since mid-March, choosing instead to participate via televised or online services for safety’s sake.

I don’t think that restrictions on number of people in church attendance is at all an attempt to limit free exercise of religion. Being in church for a service is not like being in a store. In stores, people are mostly  silent, not near the same people for any length of time, and spending shorter amounts of time in an enclosed space. In churches, people are in one spot for an extended period, usually about an hour. They are speaking and singing; singing in particular is known to spread droplets much further than six feet. Masks do help prevent virus spread, but they do not do so 100%, so singing presents an additional risk.

Church attendance is more closely analogous to going to an indoor movie or concert. In my state, neither of those activities are allowed at all. Places of worship are allowed with restrictions on numbers in attendance. I think that rather than being overly restrictive, governments have been trying to help faith communities gather in person rather than being totally virtual in worship, while trying to keep risk relatively low.

The virus does not care whether people are in a store or a church or a home or a restaurant. It’s up to all of us to protect ourselves to the extent possible. When government officials are following science in their rules, we should accept that and not think that they are infringing on our rights rather than protecting public health.

another day

So, as I write this, it is December 25th which we celebrate as Christmas, but 2020 is very different.

I haven’t been able to post much this month, in large part because we have been dealing with some health difficulties with my father, known here as Paco. He spent five days in the hospital and, earlier this week, was admitted to the skilled nursing and rehabilitation unit in the senior community where he lives.

Because of COVID restrictions, no visitors are allowed but we have been in touch by phone. Before he went to rehab, we did have a family early-Christmas celebration, but we sent a couple of small gifts to his room so he would have something to open today.

We hope to videochat with daughter E and family in London UK this afternoon, which will be evening there. They have already posted photos of granddaughters ABC and JG in their holiday attire. Last night, we were able to watch the Christmas Eve mass from their church. While it is sad that we were not able to see them at all in 2020, technology does help.

Spouse B, daughter T, and I are spending the day at home with scaled-back gift exchange and lots of our family favorite foods, fresh-baked date nut and cranberry breads for breakfast and lasagna from Nana’s recipe with homemade braided herb bread for dinner and apple-blackberry and an outrageously good brown-sugar and maple pecan pie for dessert. B enjoys cooking and baking special meals, so he is taking the lead with all this while I act assitant. It’s nice to have familiar things in such a topsy-turvy year.

Unfortunately, the huge snowstorm we had last week that dropped forty inches (one meter) of snow on us has set us up for flood warnings today. We got about three inches (8 cm) of rain yesterday and overnight, which, coupled with at least another couple of inches from snowmelt, has led to flooding. The Susquehanna is expected to crest tonight at major flood stage level in our town. While our home should be okay, we are concerned for our neighbors who live closer to the river.

I know for many Christians around the world, this Christmas is very different than the usual celebrations, but the underlying message of peace and good will to all is still there to bring comfort to us in these troubled times. I share wishes for peace and good will, for good health and love with all of you; whatever your personal faith or philosophy might be, these gifts are universal.

progress for Pfizer

Today is an important day for the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine.

In the United Kingdom, the first doses are being given, predominantly to those over the age of eighty. The recipients will need a second dose in three weeks.

In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration has published a 53-page review of the Pfizer/BioNTech data and confirmed the findings of safety and 95% efficacy. This clears the way for a public hearing on Thursday and possible emergency use authorization within days. Distribution will start within 24 hours of approval.

It is good that so much of the data is now public because you can see that the vaccine is safe and effective across different age, racial, and comorbidity groups. There is also evidence that some protection develops from the first of the two doses, although the highest level of protection begins about a week after the second dose.

As a Pfizer trial participant, I expect to hear back from the researchers shortly after the approval goes through. Pfizer plans to offer the vaccine to people in the placebo group in order to continue their long-term study on efficacy and safety. Among our family in the study, we expect that we have two who have already received two doses of the vaccine and one who is in the placebo group.

I can assure you that the suspected placebo person is anxious to join the vaccine group as soon as possible!

today

This wasn’t the plan.

I expected right now I would be in a plane somewhere over the Atlantic after a month in the UK visiting daughter E and her family, meeting granddaughter JG, walking granddaughter ABC home from nursery school, celebrating US Thanksgiving in London on what is there just the fourth Thursday of November.

I thought I would get to attend mass for the first time since March as we celebrated JG’s baptism, wearing the white dress that I, E, and ABC wore before her, as well her Aunt T and great-aunts.

Of course, there would have been two weeks in quarantine before any of the visiting, but still…

It was a blessing in disguise that the news of the UK lockdown leaked early, before we flew out, so that there was time to cancel. It took most of the month, but I finally got all the charges refunded.

I had planned to get a lot of writing done while we were in quarantine and to do a long-delayed, self-guided retreat, neither of which happened this month as the usual things that needed doing were before us here and the inevitable bumps in the road appeared that needed attention. I was also impossible to ignore/escape the maelstrom of news on the election and its aftermath and of the horrifying, continuing escalation of the coronavirus pandemic.

Enter the first Sunday of Advent, with its message of watching in hope.

I’m struggling with that.

By nature, I’m neither an optimist nor a pessimist. I try to be more of a realist. I know that with over 13 million confirmed cases so far and a seven-day average of new confirmed cases of about 160,000, compounded by Thanksgiving travel, the United States is going to have further acceleration in COVID cases in December and most likely into January, as well. There are also going to be spikes in hospitalizations and deaths flowing from that. Although there will likely be some vaccine administration starting in December, there won’t be enough to make much of a dent in transmission. The exception is that, if health care workers are vaccinated first as expected, we may be able to keep our hospitals staffed well enough to meet the surge in cases this winter.

I do have hope that the incoming Biden administration will have staff and appointees who are capable of improving the lives of people here and beginning to repair our international relationships. However, I am disheartened by the efforts of the current administration to undermine the chances that Biden’s team can implement changes quickly and easily. There are a number of last-minute rule changes, treaty withdrawals, troop withdrawals, and other measures that will make the transition even more difficult than anticipated in this time of public health emergency, economic downturn, civil rights protests, and general distrust in government.

Sigh.

So, one foot in front of the other. Doing the best I can manage under the circumstances.

Stay tuned.

Thanksgiving 2020

The fourth Thursday of November is celebrated as Thanksgiving Day in the United States. It’s traditional to gather with family and friends for a big dinner, usually turkey with lots of side dishes.

This Thanksgiving will be quieter for many of us because of the pandemic. Cases are rising across the country and in many states are already so numerous that hospitals are running out of space for patients. Frighteningly, millions of people are not heeding the advice of public health experts and are travelling long distances and/or gathering in groups larger than ten or with people outside their household, thus increasing the danger of even higher case counts in December.

Our plan for the day is for spouse B, daughter T, and I to go to Paco’s apartment in his senior community where we will have a Zoom session with my sisters and daughter E. In that way, Paco will get to see his great-granddaughters ABC and JG who will be celebrating American Thanksgiving on an ordinary (lockdown) Thursday in London, UK. B,T, and I were supposed to be in London with them near the end of a month-long visit until the lockdown there cancelled our trip. Once I have Paco set up with the Zoom session on this laptop, I’ll go to another room with another device so he can take his mask off.

After our video chat, Thanksgiving dinner will be delivered to the apartment and we will eat with Paco on one side of the room and B, T, and me on the other as we will need to take our masks off to eat. We will leave expeditiously after dinner so as to limit our contact time.

It won’t be the usual Thanksgiving, but it will be special in its own way.

The point of the holiday is to give thanks but the gratitude this year is tinged with sorrow and regret. I am very grateful that our family is weathering this very disrupted year. B is able to work from home and we are able to stay safe at home for the most part. We certainly miss being able to visit Paco every day and are sad to not be able to travel to the UK to visit for all of 2020, but it would be so horrifying and dangerous to have inadvertently exposed someone to COVID that the separation is necessary.

I am grateful for Governor Cuomo and all the medical personnel and other essential workers who have worked so hard to keep as many of us safe and well as possible. At the same time, I mourn the millions of people in the US and around the world who have been impacted by the coronavirus, either by illness or death of themselves or a loved one or loss of work, shelter, food security, medical care, etc. I am also dreading the coming weeks, which are projected to see a steep rise in cases on top of already soaring rates in the US. There have already been over 12.8 million confirmed cases and 261,000 deaths and the thought of millions more is overwhelming.

I am grateful that the Biden /Harris administration is starting to take shape with the announcement of well-qualified people to key posts. At the same time, I’m sad to see so many not accepting the facts of the situation and not being willing to join in the efforts to come together to fight the pandemic, revive our communities, and unite as one nation.

I’m grateful for the ideals of our country but sad that we are so far from embodying them.

I feel similarly about the Catholic church. I’m grateful for the moral grounding, social doctrine, integral ecology principles, and primacy of love that it has taught me, but sorrowful and penitent about the many abuses of power done in its name, including war, torture, colonialism, racism, sexism, clericalism, sexual abuse and cover-up, and oppression of other religions and peoples over centuries.

So, yes, a very different Thanksgiving. With widespread vaccine use possible by November 2021, maybe next year will be more “normal.”

Or, maybe, there will be no going back to what used to be considered normal.

I pray that we can finally build institutions that live up to their high ideals for the good of all creation.

X years ago

Facebook often presents users with the opportunity to repost something from prior years. Today, it suggested this photo from two years ago:

a post-dinner four generation photo of me, Nana, daughter E, and granddaughter ABC

This was our last Thanksgiving with my mom, known here as Nana. She passed away from congestive heart failure the following May. Daughter E and granddaughter ABC moved to London, UK, that October when E’s spousal visa finally came through. ABC is now in nursery school and big sister to JG, whom we planned to meet this month until England went into a new pandemic lockdown phase.

It’s a lot in two years.

And it seems like it’s been longer than two years.

Three days ago, one of my poet-friends posted a photo from the Tupelo Press/Studios at MASS MoCA residency from which the Boiler House Poets Collective sprang five years ago. In the comment thread that followed, someone asked if anyone had written about it, which prompted me to re-read my blog posts from the residency. This post links to most of them. It was interesting to read my real-time take on what was happening, although I did temper the amount of anxiety I expressed somewhat. It was nice to see that I accomplished more than I remembered and good to be reminded of our various sessions with our poet-teachers and the bonding among our original nine poets-in-residence.

We have gone back to North Adams for a reunion residency every autumn, until being derailed this year by COVID. We have a reservation for both 2021 and 2022, though, which is tempering the sadness at missing this year a bit.

And, yes, those five years feel longer than they are, too.