Thanks to Laurie’s prompting, my husband and I went and got the new updated COVID vaccine yesterday. It was free at CVS—actually, better than free—we each got a $5 coupon. The pharmacist said she had eighty appointments to give the shot yesterday, so people in Massachusetts are taking it seriously.
Sadly, we’re not getting good public health information from our federal government any longer in the United States. Fascists and quacks are running the show. People are actually dying of measles again here in the US, while Dear Leader breaks ground on his Triumphal Arch.
Clearly not very well, based on yesterday’s post, which I have since deleted because it was so whiny. (Turns out I got all the information I needed about the out-of-town wedding later that day.)
As Tina of A Midlife Adventure once noted that one of the good outcomes of COVID is that nearly all travel plans are cancellable these days. I’ve had to cancel both my Dance Camp and Acadia National Park trips because I have developed plantar fasciitis in my left heel. It started after my Circle Dance in June. I was wearing cheap shoes and we did a flat-footed dance and I think I just stomped too hard for too long. I’m finally getting physical therapy for it, but I can’t walk very far at the moment.
Life is totally uncertain. Everyone knows this, but people over 60 really know it. Sadly, we all have close friends and family members who have died. I guess the main things you can do in the face of uncertainty are: 1) Breathe; 2) Gather as much information as you can about the issue at hand (burying your head in the sand rarely helps); and 3) Don’t get too attached to your plans!
What’s a chapter of your life you’d title “The Hard Years” — and what got you through it?
Not to bring up politics AGAIN, but I think the period from Hillary Clinton losing the presidential election (despite winning the popular vote by 2.8M), through Trump’s total mishandling of the COVID pandemic (and the subsequent cancellation of my son’s senior spring of high school), to today’s completely surreal dismantling of the post-WW2 order and the subversion of everything I believed my country stood for, under a wildly corrupt wannabe dictator and sexual predator, has been fucking hard.
Hard to watch
Hard to believe
Hard to afford
And it ain’t over yet…
I’m definitely angrier, sadder, and a bit meaner than I was in 2016.
The old me, going to vote for Hillary Clinton in my silly pantsuit in 2016
I’m not a big masking fan. I mean, I was at the beginning. I was adamant. Then the vaccines came out. I got them, including all the boosters. By summer 2022, I was pretty much done with masking, so I threw caution to the wind and came down with COVID in early October after attending a funeral unmasked. I did not get terribly sick, but I did take Paxlovid because people said it helped if you started on it early. My husband also came down with it, but wasn’t too sick. He also took Paxlovid. Unfortunately, I ended up getting bouts of vertigo about ten days in (when I was otherwise feeling OK) and then had a lot of trouble with my hearing and tinnitus that still has not fully resolved.
For this reason, I really do not want to contract COVID again, but masking is just not fun. My husband had a cough in January and did not want to test because he didn’t want to mess up his gym schedule. Finally, when the cough was keeping him up at night, I forced him to test and it was COVID. I moved to the other bedroom and made him wear a mask at home for a few days. I did not come down with it. (Maybe the boosters actually worked.)
I’ve worn masks a few times recently. When I was going to Florida to visit my elderly parents in February, I wore a mask most of the time in the airport and on the plane. I also wore a mask at church when I had a cold that was not COVID a few weeks ago.
Basically, my tolerance for unmasked sick people is lower now. If you’re obviously coughing and sneezing, I don’t want to be near you. I wish sick people would either stay home or wear a mask. (Apologies to allergy sufferers.)
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