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| Stay the course |
Stay the course...what has kept us on course since March 2020? Perhaps it was family, friends, neighbors or careers? None of us could have imagined that a virus that travels through the air searching for the next nasal passage or eye socket would still be on its reconnaissance assignment combing and poking around freelance restaurants, churches, schools, gyms, waterparks, and hospitals like a conquistador looking for its next target. Nor did any of us ever think we would be absent from life's milestones, i.e., welcoming newborn babies into families, celebrating weddings and anniversaries, eulogizing final farewells to loved ones, expressing Godspeed to those who relocated, commending high school and college graduates, and surrendering calculated and budgeted vacations. None of us...ever thought.
Consequently, here we linger six months later (including March) reading a blog entitled " Hold On" as if to imply that we have seized a steel cable and we are holding on until we can let go. Then what? We have the hope of experiencing things as they used to be. Of course, like you, we have found ample time to pray for that.
However, consider this: how has six months of evading a contagious virus changed you? For us, at first during mid-March, extended Spring Break, suspended work weeks, stay-at-home persuasions did not seem so bad. We found ourselves appreciating a reason to sleep in, to stock up, and to aimlessly read during the cooler, wet days of March. But somehow April, May, June, July and August attached themselves to March. We got caught in the middle of all of this: we sold our house mid-March before we knew, really knew. By June, we had resettled in Arizona and, for us, an "On Hold" was contained inside the "Hold On." Driver's licenses, car plates, banking, medical record transfers, certification transfers all began with On-Hold phone calls in hour-long queues. Hiring a contractor? Transferring utilities? Shopping for Internet providers? Carve out time because these require telecommunication! On the upside, updating an address, registering to vote, and comparing insurance quotes can be done online. Oh, and the supply chain infringed on just about everything we wanted to purchase - backorders, rain checks, and shipping dates were impacted. Comedy abounds when you move during a pandemic.
How have we changed since March? We have learned to behave better in a queue. We breathe and are thankful we can. We embrace FB notes and phone calls like never before. We appreciate time, books, each other, family, and a little bit of media.
Like the sailboat in the photo above on Lake Zurich, we have to stay the course in order to land safely on the other side. We'll get there..."Hold On" together.
