Three Ironies of My Current Situation...

The world is turned upside down with quarantines and social distances. Frankly, I don’t know what to think about it at all. At first, I thought it was overkill – surely the numbers didn’t speak to this being a bigger crisis than the yearly flu! But then entities besides the government started canceling things – in spite of the damage to their balance sheets.

It gave me pause.

What if what we usually do to avoid the flu will not be enough? What about the immunocompromised people amongst my family and friends? What about our parents, in the highest risk group?

My life, in normal times, is not highly social. I live and work on a farm. Social distancing is not hard to accomplish for us…But as the world around us shuts down, I’m feeling a bit off-balance. Not scared of illness, but gob-smacked that our world can be so changed so swiftly.

It makes one wonder about other crises that are possible.

And I have to note three ironies on the timing of this circumstance:

1.  In January and February, in the midst of holiday let-down, I contemplated a serious commitment to being a hermit – to keep my world pretty small and not get out in the community as much as previously. However, I had concluded that for good mental health I really need to interact with people regularly and should make a commitment to get together with people every week.

2  2.  I realized that I was really overstocked in my pantry and supplies. I decided I really needed to cut back and so have been living on my pantry, priding myself on how it is emptying out.

3  3. Our family – kids, grands, parents, siblings – have been plagued with many colds & viruses all through January and February. We were finally healthy and ready to resume normal activities this week.

So it is abundantly clear that I don’t have the gift of prophecy. But I’m more concerned whether I have the gift of faith because this unusual circumstance is certainly a test of my trust in God. I suppose that after a week or so we’ll be more accustomed to the new feelings of limitation, but right now isn’t it just disconcerting?