This is an Orange Cockwomble. You may note a distinct resemblance to a familiar figure. If I live through this, I will send you a copy of this impressive figure, should you desire one. Leave me a message in the comments at the end of this post.
After drawing this very early this morning, I started writing on a real tear, if you could picture someone typing on a manual typewriter at cartoonishly high speed with papers flying up in the air around me, that was kind of what it was like. I went back to work on my paying job which kept me busy and distracted for a while, and later spoke to my grandchildren for the first time in weeks (they're young, talking to Nana on the phone is not exactly their go-to fun thing on the regular). While talking to them, I dampened the huge lump in my throat. My God I miss them in a way that's leaving me breathless.
Here's what my grandson, 11, is doing: "NOTHING", he says,"JUST SCHOOLWORK." and proceeded to smack his sister in the face with a pina colada-scented butt wipe.
My granddaughter, 8, however, told me about a project she did about "weird creatures" including the Goblin shark, Dumbo octopus, Blue Mexican alligator lizard, Blue dragon sea slug and the most squee of all, the Venezuelan poodle moth. I present you with said creature:
Isn't our world just fantabulous? Squeeee!
Then I read two posts on Facebook and came to a full stop. Erase. Start over.
First, my old pal in New York City, Jeff Moche, magician, wisecracker, entrepreneur, wrote something that grabbed me by the heart.
He wrote:
"I think we should actually all be thankful for this coronavirus outbreak. And I’m being 100% sincere.
(I realize that this may make some people angry or upset, but maybe it’s important to say.)
There have been warnings of a global pandemic since at least 2010, and of how we were very unprepared for this. Bill Gates gave a well-known TED talk a few years ago, speaking very direly about this. And in a recent interview I saw, he said that nothing had really been done since then to deal with it.
So, I guess this was what was needed for us to wake up and take this threat very seriously. Of course, I hope that we will get through this without too much pain. But it probably had to be this severe, or we’d have continued to ignore it. And for god’s sake, I hope we don’t just forget it.
The forecast now is that 100,000 or more people may die in the U.S. alone. And I might be one of them. I’m also truly sorry that many of us will lose someone that we know. But then I guess, that was a sacrifice for the team!
THIS IS A FIRE DRILL! It had to be this real. And we had to know in a complete way where the weaknesses were."
See that little bolded part? Yeah that's the part that should stop you up, but the rest of the message is even more important, truly. If I live, I hope to whatever Powers there are in the Universe to see that we have learned something from this and alter how we live, change how we prepare ourselves, and frankly, stop treating this planet and its non-human inhabitants like worthless shit. Treating people less like shit would also be a boon. It's all symbiotic, and if we don't learn from this, we deserve to be doomed.
I honestly just want to see my grandchildren again. That's all I'm asking here, God/Goddess/Universe. When are we going to stop and see that we are absolutely destroying ourselves and our planet? This little virus with the corona-like hook that can't be shook loose is growing and mutating and soon to be taking people out by the thousands, not hundreds, maybe hundreds of thousands, and it is our fucking fault.
Another person, who I often do not agree with wrote a post from an entirely different perspective, but this resonated.
"Confinement, isolation, conformity and the encouragement by our governments to fuel our disapproval of others is a slipper slope and I'd start thinking about the long term consequences of that. One of the most consequential of which will be that Trump's re-election is almost guaranteed..."
This is probably true. Conformity to government orders and encouragement of public disapproval of other people by way of implementing public restrictions historically does result in the re-election of the government already in power. I don't want to go Godwin's Law again, but harken back and see if it's not true. She mentioned another troubling list of behaviors that increase during times of stress and confinement, and I've expanded that a bit. I know that social studies have shown to be true that (I know that I should provide citations):
- Drug and alcohol abuses increases
- Domestic violence increases
- Child abuse increases
- Opportunistic crimes of theft increase
- Violent crimes increase
- Animals are abandoned/sheltered in high numbers
While it is reasonable to keep people from harming each other, are the restrictions too much? This Facebook poster appears to think so. However, this virus is cannier than we are at survival, I think. It clearly could take almost all of us out very quickly, maybe that's what needs to happen. But again, I want to see my son and my grandchildren: I don't want to die yet.
What is the happy medium? Is there one?
I ventured out today as I had to buy crickets for Kallista's lizard, Cutie. Since I was already out, I went to Safeway, masked and ready to cower from humans. No toilet paper, no cleaning products. Wiped out by 10 a.m. apparently, even with a purchase limit of one. I picked up some fruit and vegetables, a pork butt and some cornish game hens. I want some kalua pig, and I already have poi and rice. The chicken and biscuits I made the other night was awful, not really a fault of mine, but so disappointing. I'm trying not to snack very much and eating a lot of oranges which I crave for some reason.
Oranges were coming to my office bagfuls by coworkers who have orange trees. The fruits were so amazing, sweet, juicy, bursting with the scent and flavor of orange. If color had a flavor it could be orange. Lacking my coworkers wonderful orbs of love, I'm making due with store-bought ones and they are good.
My mom would approve as she believed Vitamin C cures everything. Colds or flu? Vitamin C, Sore throat? Vitamin C. Herpes? Vitamin C. Broken arm? Vitamin C, and so forth. My mom kept plain, sour 1200 mg vitamin C's in her car and sucked on them like Lifesavers. If she were here today, she'd be sucking on them till Kingdom come and she'd probably never get this virus.
My last stop was Walgreen's for distilled water for my CPAP machine. I have very severe sleep apnea due to a congenitally 'crowded' throat, as well as soft palate issues (probably due to the 80s and associated abuses). It occurs to me that my many years of smoking and the sleep apnea put me at high risk.
The White House projects there will be 100,000 or more deaths coming up in the next few weeks. That scares me a lot, because it can't be me, and it can't happen to anyone I love... and yet it can.
Inspired by the poodle moth, I leave you one of my favorite pieces from Archie & Mehitabel, by Don Marquis:
“From 'the lesson of the moth':
and before i could argue himout of his philosophy he went and immolated himself on a patent cigar lighter i do not agree with him myself i would rather have half the happiness and twice the longevity
but at the same time i wish there was something i wanted as badly as he wanted to fry himself”
That's all I got for now.
peace, love & health,
Heather/Hanai'ali'i
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