I close my eyes or don’t watch movies with scenes of torture, or when a child dies or a pet is hurt.
So it’s been tough watching my grandkids, 4th and 7th grade, sitting, sitting, staring in front of a computer monitor for electronic ‘supposed’ learning, off and on the last months.
I ventured out to Palm Harbor Nursery yesterday to buy red geraniums.
“Don’t go out!” I hear the CDC voice, but I go out anyway. The sun is shining in the great state of Florida.
During the purchase, the owner shared her horror about the kids in New York City who have been banished to E Learning. I agreed with her. The Academy of Pediatrics has stated that the safest place for children during The Virus is in brick and mortar schools.
Last Sunday, friends shared their experience visiting their elderly mother in a senior living facility.
“They wouldn’t let us hug her goodbye, after the fifteen minutes, and she was crying.”
After nine months, these are not isolated cruelties, but repeated over and over and over,
“Be safe,” everybody says to everybody now.
We’re sick of hearing it because it has created, not a safer world, but an unhealthy way of existing in our homes, churches, schools and businesses that used to bring life and joy.
The news media continues to peddle fear and misunderstanding so that we continue to tune in tomorrow. They’re desperate for ratings. They have become expert in making us feel. They should be helping us to understand.
The biggest turning point of 2020 is upon us. Covid vaccines are ready for approval and distribution. We’ll be able to put this season of misery and death behind us. However, in the misguided ideal of reporting both sides of the issue, the news continues to give air time to vaccine naysayers.
Many politicians, and the medical politicians at our CDC only make the problem worse.
We’re advised to not: not go out, not get together with family for the holiday or any time, not travel, not touch. That is cruel. I can’t remember one week for the last nine months when the word ‘Surge’ wasn’t a headline in the newspaper, but the present week is always, according to The Experts, the beginning of The Worst. That’s emotional torture.
In actor Alec Guinness’ autobiography “Blessings in Disguise” he describes his search for God during World War II. He describes how he, along with many soldiers, turned to God, reading the New Testament on their Navy ship, in the days before battle and possible death.
God is still our help, and we acknowledge Him as the source of providing treatments and vaccines for Covid. He is our healer.
In Agatha Christie’s “An Autobiography,” she describes what life was like in London during the years of World War II:
“So time went on, now not so much like a nightmare as something that had been always going on, had always been there. It had become, in fact, natural to expect that you yourself might be killed soon, that the people you loved best might be killed, that you would hear of the death of friends…”
Later, she reflects on the virtue that made those cruel days livable:
“…we can hope… we do not appreciate that second virtue in the trilogy ‘faith, hope, love.’ … how often do we forget that there is hope as well, and that we seldom think about hope? We are ready to despair too soon…” – Agatha Christie
The simplest shopping trip, over the last few months, could be a cause for despair. I’d overhear a customer snap at another customer, “Stand back six feet from me!” Or encounter empty shelves. But yesterday, I had a different, delightful experience. I stopped in at “The Painted Pear,” one of the few specialty shops of handmade and unique gifts that has not gone out of business because of the pandemic. After picking out Christmas tree ornaments, I spotted, on the top shelf of one of the display cases, a wooden, handmade sign:
“Courage, Dear Heart”
-C.S. Lewis
I’m a Wheaton grad and devoted fan of Lewis. He has a way of getting to the important point in a most clear and beautiful way.
I wanted to buy the sign, because it was the message I wanted to keep in front of me now.
I asked, but it wasn’t for sale.
I’ll have to make one.
Encouraging truths which hide like secrets in the newspaper, regarding The Virus:
- Safe and highly effective vaccines are almost ready to distribute.
- The Infection Mortality Rate, in spite of the constant drone of ‘case counts,’ remains extremely low, especially for the young and increasingly, because of advances in treatments, those of advancing age.
-picture taken at the College of Anesthesiologists in London, England.