Thursday, January 14th, 2021
Yet again we went for a COVID Test, hopefully to test out of quarantine if results come back negative tomorrow.
While infections ravage the country and it is important to remain vigilant, I do have the need to go back to some semblance of life after five weeks at home, safe for outings to the supermarket or the drug store. Five days total isolation followed by three weeks at home with mum and now another five days of isolation at home is just about as much as I can take. Yes, I will be wearing a mask when I leave the house. Yes, I will have very limited social interactions and all of them – safe for our bubble family – outside. It is still so much more of a life.
Speaking of virus, new infections seem to be stabilizing at around 230k every 24 hours. Today the USA is at 23.7 million known infections. Tomorrow it will reach 400k Corona related death. Rising infection numbers are largely caused by mutants and more mutations are popping up. What they have in common: They are more contagious than early variants.
I am not sure why the US is not licensing Oxford / AstraZeneca, maybe they have not yet applied. Given vaccine scarcity it would be a great relief if they did. There are now results from the trials conducted by Johnson & Johnson which to me do not read terribly convincing. Because of vaccine scarcity and doses at risk of going bad, pharmacies are using unutilized does to vaccinate random people at the end of the day, which is a great idea. It may well be time to go grocery shopping in DC.
Some humans (~5%) seem to develop a rare super-antibody response making them immune to COVID. Secretly I am wishing that whatever I had in January 2020 was COVID and that I might have developed such antibodies. I would happily share with friends and family!
2020 in hindsight is a wasted year in my life. There was so much I had planned to do and so little I could do. 2021 is of to a rocky start. I am still holding out hope for this young year though. Maybe I can get back onto the matt in the second half; that would be wonderful and if Aikido comes back with dojos reopening, I shall attend every single seminar I can manage just to make up for the lost time of 2020.
I have a new deck and played with the cards Tuesday. Yesterday I spend some time reading and reflecting on them. It was a good draw. Very consistent and positive which has me hopeful for the coming year. It is going to be defined by focusing on myself, following my intuition and cutting ties with my brilliant but unmindful friend. The weeks in Germany have help as I can no longer mentally connect at will. The images and vibes are distorted and if no contact is established maybe I shall succeed in what I failed at for the past four years and achieve closure. I am pretty sure I shall not hear or read anything until all of us have received our shots, by which point in time I will likely be wrapping up and moving on.
I am finding myself at peace with the outlook on the future and I am rather enjoying it. I feel I am done with a battle, which has also been of my own making. Expectations I had for myself, disappointments I have faced because against all intentions I entertain expectations of others, despite trying very hard not to expect anything; accepting reality and finding happiness in that. As my 54th birthday approaches I am rethinking my life. It feels like I need to move on. Unlike previously not knowing where or what that is, is no longer scary or daunting.
At peace.