Life in the Age of Corona

A Daily Diary

Sunday, February 14th, 2021

Valentines Day

Valentines Day is not much of an event anywhere in the world, but the USA.

My lovely daughter not only got me flowers, but also served my poached eggs with sauce hollandaise on Ciabatta bread as well as chocolate coated strawberries for breakfast in bed. We had a very relaxing morning. I completed the “Midnight Library” and seeing I could not secure a swim slot moved on to Barack Obama’s “A Promised Land”. Given I have no Valentine and EM is out with her BF I have plenty of time to get started on the 700 pages. And this is just the first half!

EM and the BF, J., left for a drive around noon with the promise to be back for the photo shoot I had arranged; and they were.  I am so happy for her experiences of American life.

I was most surprised to receive a Valentine card as well as flowers from J. The card is rather sweet and very unexpected seeing we have had some differences as I berated him for voting for the orange Cheeto.

The card thoughtfully states that he and I see different sides of EM, which I am sure is correct. It also states that he wants EM and I to get along, which is rather worrisome as I have felt we have been a great team for years. Admittedly, we have had some falling outs in recent months, but I attributed these to the generally difficult situation and the emotional stress we all find ourselves in, not a broader not getting along, especially after the birthday card she gave me, attesting "best mum ever" I shall quiz EM on this. J.also promises they will spend more time at our house, hoping to become friends with me. I will most certainly give it a shot. All in all a very nice gesture and an olive branch which hopefully I will be able to make the most of.

Since that political argument on Halloween night, I have put a bit of thought into what was said and how to broach the subject. I am not asking him to change his views. If he feels the Orange Cheeto is it, there is nothing anyone can do anyway. What I would like to achieve is reflection on the matter and being informed, not just by one source of media, but many. I read far and wide and would expect him to do the same. To me this is about learning how to form an opinion based on many different sources. We shall see how that goes.

Knowing my daughter, she is likely to be rather serious about this, though I do hope she will have the opportunity to experience other relationships, before she settles on "the one". Something tells me, this may not happen, so I had better figure out how to get along with this potential son in law, who has seen nothing of the world to date.

As far as I can tell EM’s choice of university will lead him to broaden his horizon. I shall pay the EUR 2.000 next week to secure her spot at IE Madrid and we shall see if he choses Florida over a year overseas.

Anyway, the photographer never showed up, so I ended up doing a photoshoot with them. They are a cute couple and it is clear they are very close and happy together. After the pictures the two of them headed out to diner and I am left to my own devices.

The FWB has the kids over, so not an option. I will just stay by my fire with Mr Obama’s book and a glass of red wine.

I did arrange to speak to my new neighbor who is helping me with reactivating my horribly rusty French. A lovely person who arrived in the DMV with her family in the middle of the pandemic. It is hard for them as none of them have any friends here and establishing new social contacts with everyone isolating is difficult. I hope I can be a little helpful to her sort of as a payback for her putting up with my horrid French.

The pandemic is of course still raging, albeit in regress. 61k new cases were reported over the past twenty-four hours to bring the US total to 28.2 million. As we are getting closer to the one-year mark, only twenty-five days to go, I cannot help but wonder if we will be able to get shots a year after this mess began, which would put us into March.

Bhutan, a country I have always wanted to visit and am weirdly fond of, has managed a near perfect response to the pandemic, with only a single death to date. There are many wealthier nations which could learn from Bhutan. Firstly, there was national unity in managing the crisis, secondly, the government took care of those financially vulnerable, and thirdly, there is a basic health care system catering to all. I am impressed by their response and their solidarity as a nation. It is inconceivable to see this in the very individualistic USA.

On the funny side of things, I came across an article about online dating Apps. Amidst the pandemic they saw a significant increase in users. This should hardly be surprising seeing people are locked up in their houses.  I mean how else would you meet someone?

While I may not meet anyone, I admittedly enjoy the distraction of texting with different people.