Pat Bertram's Blog, page 101

Repercussions

[image error]There is much talk about the financial fallout from the stay-at-home orders and the quarantine, but there are other possible repercussions no one is mentioning. For example, with families being forced into a closed environment, any issues or potential problems could be exacerbated. Problems like abuse. Problems like incest.

Shortly after my first two novels were published, I had a text conversation with my sister, who had just finished reading the books. I asked her if it was strange reading a $&X scene written by her sister. (Just so you know, I am not averse to using the word, I’m just trying to hide it from google.) I posted the conversation here on my blog because I was so tickled with her observations.

A couple of months later, on the list of search engine terms people use to find my blog, I noticed a lot of incestual queries. There was no mistaking the meaning of the terms. They were explicit: how to F*** my sister, tips to have $&X with my sister.

Not one to sneer at a gift from the writing gods, even such a sleezy gift as this, I wrote a blog: $&X With Sister Tips — Writing Tips, That Is. (The more views a site gets, the higher it’s ranked by search engines, and so the more views it gets.) It is by far the most viewed blog I have ever written, but in the past couple of weeks, with so many people staying at home, the views have more than quintupled. People don’t want to know how to write about it. They want to do it. The terms people used today include: how to f*** your sister; how to make $&X sister tips; how to do $&X with my sister; how can i have $&X with my sister.

Even worse, people are leaving comments such as: “I really love my sister she is so cute and gorgeous but how do i ask her to have $&X with me? I want it really bad with her like right now.”

All those poor girls. Do they know what creeps their siblings are?

I wonder how many people are huddling fearfully in their rooms now that they can’t go to school or work or the mall to get away from abuse or potential abuse. And why aren’t we hearing any of these stories? You can’t tell me the stories aren’t out there. You can’t tell me people aren’t suffering. But then, such stories are almost always kept quiet to keep from destroying the family.

I considered deleting the articles I mentioned above, and yet, there are writers who use incest as a theme. Besides, it’s not going to stop people from wanting what they can’t have, and it’s not going to stop them from trying even if they weren’t forced to stay at home. But it does give the saying, “There’s no place like home,” a different meaning.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

Holding Pattern

My garage is here. As you can see, it needs to be put together, but who knows when that will be. One of the construction workers is sick and they have to wait for the test results, though I have a hard time believing he has The Bob. What are the odds of one of the five people I have seen in the past two weeks being the only person in the county to have it?

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Still, they can’t go by the odds, so we’re all waiting for test results.

When they were going to be here building the garage, they were also going to fix my toilet (the wax ring needs to be replaced) and while the water was turned off, they were going to fix the crumbling plaster wall behind the commode, but that probably won’t happen. They will try to get here fix the toilet, and we’ll try to figure out the safest way to do that (me, being “elderly,” staying away from them, and then disinfecting the bathroom afterward). They would wait if they could, but if the floor rots from all the moisture, they’d have to fix it, and their agenda is full enough.

On the other hand, if I don’t have a toilet, I won’t need toilet paper. (Joke.)

Like almost everyone else, I am in a holding pattern, though I have to admit, it has more to do with a wonky knee than any stay-at-home order. Luckily, the knee has healed enough so I can walk around the house without support from my hiking poles. (The poor things are still in shock from that ignoble use.)

I’m used to waiting, though, so it’s not as if living in a holding pattern is anything new.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

“The Bob” Commentary

Social distancing might be holding in the over-60 population, at least to an extent, but it does not seem to concern the younger folk. Today I’ve seen more groups walking than I have in the year I’ve been here. I don’t know if that’s been the case all along since I’ve stayed inside babying my knee, but today I thought I should challenge myself, so I went outside for a short walk. (If 300 steps can be considered a walk.) I might have stayed out longer, but in that short time, one single walker and two closely-packed trios passed me. In all cases, I crossed the street to get away from them, but still, there they were.

Making matter worse, one of the guys horked up a wad of mucus in front of my house. Really? Really? I don’t understand people, and they sure as heck don’t understand health safeguards.

Needless to say, I took I wide berth around that mess, and came back inside where I am safe. (Just because I think there’s way too much hype over The Bob  doesn’t mean I don’t take precautions. In fact, I take these same precautions when it comes to any flu or other contagious disease. And I might as well admit it, I always cross the street to avoid people when I’m out walking unless I know them — it’s a leftover safety measure from when I lived in a big city.)

There are many loopholes in this stay-at-home order. Except for the closures — places where people obviously can’t go — they can go anywhere and do anything as long as they say they are taking a walk or getting essential items. Some people — couples and families — are going en masse to the stores that are open more as a recreational thing than because they really need the merchandise. And the early shopping hours for seniors are a joke — so many congregate outside the doors of places like Walmart, waiting to get in, that it seems to create more of a problem than it solves.

So why issue stay-at-home orders when it’s so easy to get around them? Well, I do know one reason — by establishing their locale as a scene of disaster, the local governments are positioning themselves for federal relief funds. But for the rest, who knows. There is much going on that we are not privy to.

Speaking of privy (chuckling at my wit here), I did some research on the toilet paper shortage.

I don’t know why no one is admitting that a percentage of our bathroom tissue is imported from China, but it is. (A Walmart employee told me that’s where their store brand comes from.) According to the Observatory of Economic Complexity: The top exporters of toilet paper are China ($2.84B), Germany ($2.78B), Japan ($1.67B), Poland ($1.4B) and Italy ($1.26B). The top importers are the United States ($2.29B), Germany ($1.79B), China ($1.43B), France ($1.33B) and the United Kingdom ($1.26B). So, as you can see — if you curtail the imports, there is a definite shortage. Even if the shortfall is only 10%, that shortfall soon escalates into a massive shortage as people try to stay ahead of their needs.

I’m shaking my head at myself. I had no intention of ever even mentioning any aspect of this current medical situation in my daily blog posts (190 days in a row as of today), but it is there. And it is hard to ignore.

Of course, if the guys would come and build my garage, I’d have something more exciting to write about. Meantime, there is just me, my computer, and vast numbers of articles and commentaries about The Bob flooding the internet streams. And now, with this blog, there is one more.

In case you’re sick of all this, here’s something to brighten your life: today is National Crayon Day. Happy coloring!

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

 

Gifts for These Times

Much of the rhetoric surrounding The Bob continues to mystify me. Today several links showed up in my Facebook feed touting the necessity for testing everyone in the country and vilifying those who aren’t with the program. And yet, a recent study showed that accuracy of the tests varied depending on how and when samples were collected. For example, if a person was infected with the disease, but the test is done too early before there is a great enough concentration of the virus to detect, then the person is given a clean bill of health and is left to infect everyone they come in contact with. If a person has symptoms, then the tests are more accurate, but they are still not exact. Chest CT scans accurately identified infection in 98 percent of cases whereas RT-PCR tests detected it correctly 71 percent of the time.

It makes sense, then, to continue the way things are, testing people who show symptoms to enable the medical establishment to set a treatment protocol. But for the rest of us? How does getting tested help? If we test negative, we still have to stay away from people because a) we might be sick and b) we might still get sick. And if we test positive, but don’t feel sick, we still have to stay away from people.

Despite my concerns about people getting all het up about this disease and demanding results when no one knows for sure what is really going on, I am staying away from people.

That is, I am staying away except for a brief time today.

Today a friend stopped by bearing gifts — a lovely pad Thai, a vial of healing oil (for my knee) made by a monk, and an even more healing hug.

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Yeah, I know. Keep one’s distance. But truly, if I were to die because of a hug, then . . . well, then I’d be dead and wouldn’t care. And if I were to get sick? I’ll do what I’ve always done — go to bed, stop eating, drink water, and wait for my body to heal itself. So far, it’s worked, even with some very serious and rather painful illnesses.

But I’m not concerned about any repercussions from a simple hug. I’ve already spent time with these friends during this era of disease, and so far, we’re doing well.

I’m also doing well on the gift front. I got an email notification today of a gift that will be arriving in the next couple of weeks:[image error]

That cracked me up. The perfect gifts for these times!

Nature, too, is bringing me gifts. This little beauty is no bigger than my thumbnail.

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I checked my order of bulbs from last fall, and I did order miniature daffodils, but by the description, it seemed as if they were simply smaller versions of the normal daffodils, not these itty-bitty things. In fact, until I took a photo, I didn’t even realize what they were! They are cute, though. I wouldn’t mind a whole yard of them. They are supposed to spread like normal daffodils, but they also go to seed, so there’s hope.

And if not, there’s always next year.

Because yes, for most people, there will be a next year and the wonderful gift of more time.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

Reckful

Today, I made a few drop biscuits. They aren’t on my diet, but it does seem that stay-in-place orders and a damaged knee are restrictive enough without adding food limitations to the equation.

For the most part, though, I’m okay despite these constraints. I’m not even very restless, perhaps because I’d be staying at home anyway to take care of my knee. Oddly — or not so oddly, actually — today my knee doesn’t pain me so much (though it still isn’t acting quite right) but the muscles above and below the knee as well as the uninjured knee all ache. Makes sense, of course. Because I’ve been walking abnormally, when I walk at all, other muscles have taken up the load and are being stretched beyond normal usage.

So many things that are a normal part of people’s lives, like eating out, don’t matter to me when they’re gone because I seldom visit such places anymore. (When I moved here, I left behind my lunch companion and haven’t reinstituted the practice with anyone else.) Nor am I craving Mexican food or pizza or other restaurant fare like so many are. I’m still using up the food around the house. Hence the biscuits.

It’s been interesting seeing how different people react to the various orders we’ve been given. Some people follow through, while others refuse to even acknowledge the directives, either because they’re young enough to feel invincible or are simply reckless.

Me? I’m the opposite of reckless. In fact, I’d be considered reckful, if there were such a word. I know there are many folks who would disagree — after all, I did take that cross-country trip in my ancient bug all my myself, and I did meet up with all sorts of people I knew only by their online presence. But that wasn’t reckless. I’d thought about all contingencies, reckoned on things going wrong and planned for them though of course I’d hoped for things to go right, and mostly, they did.

I’m especially reckful when it comes to my health, which is why I’m hunkered down at home rather than going to the doctor as so many have recommended I do. Health providers are taking people’s temperatures before letting them in the building, but that seems a bit reckless to me. Or else we aren’t being told everything we need to know about this current medical crisis. If people don’t show symptoms until perhaps two weeks after being exposed, then obviously, taking their temperature wouldn’t prove they aren’t infected. It only means the infection hasn’t shown up yet. And I’m supposed to trust that? I don’t think so.

This situation with the stay-at-home orders seems like an interesting sociological experiment, seeing what businesses are shut down and what aren’t. For example, doctors’ offices aren’t closed down, but chiropractors are. Huh? What about the people with bad backs who can’t function without these treatments? This stricture reminds me of the early years of chiropractic when one couldn’t speak of such “pseudo-doctors” without the hush of sacrilege touching people’s voices.

It also seems strange that churches are closed down, but recreational marijuana shops and liquor stores aren’t. I get the whole dissociating from other people thing, but still, the situation speaks ill of us as a people and what we consider necessary. I suppose, since I’m too reckful to get caught by either alcohol or pot usage, I’m also too naïve to understand why they are on the “essential” list. (To be fair, I don’t go to church, either, but I know a lot of people who do and who count on the weekly services.)

None of this affects me personally. I’ve always lived a stringent life, so such harsh measures don’t mean much to me.

Still, in my own reckful way, I’m being reckless. After all, the proof is in the biscuits.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

Elderly Knee

Ten years ago when Jeff died, I was in the middle of middle age, and suddenly, according the statistics being bandied about because of this current health crisis, I am “elderly.” I’m not sure how that happened, but the truth is . . . hmmm. I don’t know what the truth is. Maybe that I am older than I think I am. Or maybe I really am old enough to be at risk.

I saw a post on Facebook the other day that said you know you’re old when all your injuries are a result of sleeping weird, and that sure hit home. A few days ago, I went to sleep feeling great with all parts working, and I woke with a knee so out of whack and I could barely walk. Then a wrong step a couple of nights ago made it worse. Though the knee is marginally better today, for which I am grateful, I am using my Pacerpoles as if they were canes to keep the weight off that knee as much as possible.

It makes me feel sad for those poor demoted hiking poles. As recent as eighteen months ago, they helped me to maneuver cliffside trails, trek through overgrown forest paths, descend scree-laden desert tracks.

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Now the poles only serve to get me from room to room, and they don’t even do much of that. Mostly, I stay in one room. The daybed seems a bit easier to navigate with a bum knee since it has rails that I can use to pull myself up, and it’s a bit higher than my normal bed, so it puts less strain on my knee when I stand up.

Apparently, not only am I in the “stay at home or else” group, I’m also in the “stay in one room” group. Perhaps even the “stay in bed” group.

Sounds elderly to me.

Luckily, I have books so I don’t need to go anywhere even if I could. I should start my car to keep the gas circulated and the battery active, but the thought of having to uncover the vehicle and try to sidle into the seat without stress on the knee is too much for me to even contemplate.

And I have food. I had a few leftover tea cakes I’d made for the open house to celebrate my one-year anniversary of home ownership. I’ve been doing a good job of staying away from such treats, so I’d forgotten I had them. (Before my knee decided to go wonky on me, I’d given up deserts in an effort to lose weight to protect my knees, but my body seems to be more interested in protecting my weight than my knees.) I decided if I was going to die from a novel disease, I didn’t want to die with cake in my freezer. How sad would that be! So I ate it. And I made a stir fry with odds and ends in my refrigerator. As you can see, I’m doing fine on the food front.

Well, I’ve been sitting long enough. I better go rest my knee.

My poor elderly knee.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

I am a Ten-Year Grief Survivor

[image error]Today is the tenth anniversary of the day Jeff, my life mate/soul mate, died and to be honest, I don’t really know what to think of it. It seems such a very long time and yet no time at all. Has it really been ten years? It must be. I no longer feel that if I could just reach far enough I could touch him. I no longer expect him to call and tell me I can come home. I am home. For so long, my home was wherever he was, and now my home is where I am.

My life is so different now from what it was with him that it seems as if the loss happened to someone else. I miss him, of course, think about him almost every day, still feel a hole in my heart/life/soul where he once was, but there has been no real upsurge of grief this year. It could be that too many years have passed, but I think it has more to do with my current situation.

Physical pain somehow has a way of overriding any emotional pain, which is why so often, when new grievers get sick or injured, they get a respite from the effects of grief. I know I did. I’ve always hated being sick, hated colds especially since they linger so long in my system, and yet, those first few years after Jeff died, I welcomed those illnesses because it gave me a break from the worst of my grief.

When I was doing the research for my book, Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One, I discovered that the answer to this anomaly has to do with brain fog and the role the brain plays in grief.

Those of us who have lost our mates know that grief is not merely emotional, but also spiritual, physical, and especially mental. The whole brain is involved in the grief process, but the prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that seems to contribute the most to brain fog, the grief-induced amnesia, dazedness, and fogginess that shroud us after the death of a life mate — the prefrontal cortex is considered the executive branch of the brain and is associated with rational thinking and making sense of emotions, developing and pursuing goals as well as coordinating the brain’s activities. Because we grievers are on total emotional overload, our prefrontal cortex is unable to process all the information it is being fed from all parts of the brain. The more we try to suppress our emotions and try to think our way out of grief, the more overloaded the brain becomes.

When one is assaulted with some sort of physical trauma, such as an illness, the brain seems to heave a huge sigh of relief, as if to say, “This I understand!” No more scurrying around in the far recesses of our minds, looking for the truth of death . . . and life. No more lizard brain screaming for the loss of its survival unit. (We humans are essentially pack animals, and our very survival depends on the strength of this unit, one of the many reasons we are so deeply connected to our life mates.) No more conflicts between fight or flight hormones.

All the brain does is hunker down and send all its resources to getting the body well. And once that’s finished, grief again takes hold.

So what is my situation? A couple of weeks ago, I must have tweaked my knee while asleep because I woke up with a pain that wasn’t too severe, but kept me from doing things I normally would. I could still walk, and so I did. But the knee never got better. And yesterday, when I took a wrong step, my poor knee gave a loud crack (the kind of crack like knuckles cracking not like a bone cracking) and I felt a horrible pain. So not fun! (I now know that trekking poles make good canes.)

So today most of my energy is going toward taking care of my knee. And no, I’m not going to urgent care. (The last I heard, the closest urgent care was closed because of a case of The Bob.) And no, I’m not going to the emergency room. Considering I am in the high-risk group, I’d have to have a bone poking out of my skin before I’d take a chance on being around sick folks. And no, I don’t have a doctor. Even though I’ve been here a year, there was no reason to find one.

So here I am, taking care of my knee, doing the best I can to take care of myself even though I can barely walk. And the tenth anniversary is passing.

I miss not feeling the connection with Jeff — even though it’s only a connection of sorrow and loss — that I generally feel on the anniversaries. It’s the one time I can still feel him in my life, and I miss that. I miss him. I miss us. I miss who I was when I was with him.

The person I am today is a direct result of both my life with him and my grief after him. Is this a good thing? Am I a better person? I don’t know. I do know that, despite the constant barrage of news, all that’s going on in the world seems like . . . life as usual. When you’ve experienced one of the worst things a person can experience, all else seems rather tame.

Despite this almost blasé attitude, you can see that I still do not put myself in harm’s way if at all possible. I owe it to Jeff to live the best life I can, to savor the freedom his death gave to me. It was an inadvertent gift — his dying — but it has given me ten years of learning and experiencing and new beginnings rather than ten years of being worn down taking care of him.

Would I wish it were otherwise? I don’t know because I don’t know that woman any more. All I know is today.

And today, I am forcibly alone, missing Jeff, wondering about that road we could not take together. Would he be proud of the roads I did take? Would he be proud of me? Silly questions, I suppose. Considering the itinerary life handed me, I can’t be other than who I am today.

And today, I am a ten-year grief survivor.

And today, like every day, I miss him.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

 

International Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day

When I was in sixth grade, I got a job helping the old woman across the street. She’d just broken her arm, and needed someone to clean. Every time I went there, my stomach heaved. The jobs she gave me were all of a particularly disgusting nature. For example, she had me clean the hair catchers in her bathrooms, and I remember pulling up gobs and gobs of hair, gagging all the while. Just thinking about it now turns my stomach.

[image error]But that wasn’t the worst of my ordeal at this woman’s house. The worst was the refrigerator. Rotten fruits and vegetables. Fuzzy green unidentified leftovers. Ancient bottles and jars that were long expired or would have been if they had expiration dates. (I think expiration dates on all packaged food came much later.) I got sick every single time I went over there and I wanted to quit, but one of my parents insisted I fulfill my obligation. The other parent, in a rare moment of sticking up for me, argued that I shouldn’t have to do something that made me ill. Odd that I can’t remember which parent wanted me to go and which took my side, but it no longer matters. It was so very long ago.

But what does matter is your refrigerator. Clean it out!!!

During my nomadic years after my father died, I house sat and rented rooms in people’s houses. Invariably, in these myriad places, I found a refrigerator clogged with expired condiments and food long past the stage of edibility. I itched to clean out the refrigerators, but I refrained. Maybe the owners were sentimental about that bottle of Hershey’s syrup that was so old it was as thick as treacle and tasted about the same. Or perhaps they liked the vision of wealth a full refrigerator imparts.

In one of the places I lived, the owner gave me permission to clean out the refrigerator to give me space for my few groceries. After three hours, I had a huge stack of trash bags full of expired and rotten food. (By expired, I mean well past expiration date. Ketchup that was ten years old, eggs that were many months old, string cheese packets that were as hard as masonite. It took a chisel and lots of hot water to clean the spilled food that had congealed beneath all that detritus. (That is not an exaggeration. I did have to use a chisel.)

In the interest of health — and since most of us are under stay-at-home orders — I am declaring this International Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day.

I am begging you, please, go clean out your refrigerator. I know you have things in there you have become so accustomed to seeing that you no longer notice them. Or you have bottles of exotic ingredients you have been promising yourself to use for the past ten years. We all have those condiments and rare elements we bought for a recipe, used the requisite one teaspoon, and never got around to making that dish again. You might even have small amounts of food in your refrigerator or freezer that are still good but aren’t enough for a meal — well, soups and salads and stir-fries are all very accommodating when it comes to using left-overs.

If you’re still not convinced of the necessity of cleaning out your refrigerator, ask yourself if you really want some poor woman (maybe your mother or daughter or daughter-in-law, possibly a neighbor, perhaps even a son or husband) throwing up when/if they have clean up if you become sick or incapacitated in any way.

Please like and share this post so it goes to as many people as possible.

Thank you.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

Important Happenings

Yep! Flowers!

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And more flowers.

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And yet another.

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Even more important, assuming all non-crucial businesses aren’t shut down in the next couple of days (and assuming the lumber yard can find a driver), the materials for my garage will be delivered at the end of this week. And truly, whether anyone but me realizes it, this is crucial! To my well-being anyway. Having a garage will make my life so much easier. Not that it’s hard now — staying home, reading, interneting — what’s not to like?

I hope you’re staying home and keeping well, too.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.

Six Months

Six months ago I embarked on a challenge to blog every day for 100 days, and I am still going, but the world sure is different today than it was back then. The weather, of course, is not the same; then it was winter, now it is spring. Back then, people seemed almost innocent in their ability to block out anything that did not touch them personally, and now everyone is hunkered down over something that may or may not have a devastating effect on the total population.

But it doesn’t feel as if anything is different. With a few small exceptions, the local grocery store is fully stocked.

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The library is still lending books, though patrons have to call or email their selections ahead of time, and a librarian will meet them at the locked door to hand over the books. (I can’t help it, but this is such a clandestine, spy-ish sort of thing, that it tickles me. And oh — what a dream job! A library full of books and no annoying customers.)

And people are still struggling with devastating diseases.

I spent the morning with a dear friend who is suffering through chemo. I’m sure she’s only one of many people coping with serious illnesses while the whole world is focused on something about which there is no clear consensus and the draconian measures that may or may not be needed.

I don’t know the truth of the matter. I only know my small corner of the world (though I did face time with a woman in Bangkok today who told me about the steps Thailand is taking to keep people inside, such as closing the malls and dine-in restaurants.) And in my corner of the world, my friend is battling cancer.

It’s amazing to me how many people develop or die of various illnesses every year, including hundreds of thousand dying of the seasonal flu, and yet no one cares. But now, with this particular virus, suddenly the whole world cares.

Except me. I’m more concerned about my friend than those I only know through the various media.

During the next six months, things will change again. The virus will have passed on, will have killed us all, or will become just another disease no one cares about it until it hits home.

And, in six months, my friend will be through with her chemo, and will finding her way back to health.

And I will still be blogging, maybe not every day, but one way or another, I’ll still keep plugging away.

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[image error]Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator.