Because of COVID-19 measures, flight transfers were directed to follow the big yellow arrows on the walls. Demonstrating a unique talent and significant jetlag, we somehow got ourselves diverted, even going through customs into France. (But hey, I got a passport stamp, and luckily for France, we did not have COVID…) As we wandered aimlessly around, some glorious human (who spoke English, thank you Jesus) saw us and told us where to go to catch a bus and get back to where we needed to be.
Finally, we returned to our proper position where the adventures would continue.
When I booked the trip, we were checked through as far as Paris but not to Milan. This was a first in our travel! The website advised me I would need to see a ticket agent at the airport. That in itself was a bit of an adventure during post-COVID chaos but finally got to speak to someone in Calgary…That brings us to the West Jet agent, who told me we would just have to see a ticket agent in Paris to get the boarding pass for the next leg of our flight to Milan. West Jet Man, you are a dirty filthy liar.
We began searching for a ticket agent in the rather vast Charles De Gaulle airport. We found something that “might” be it and approached the desk. I used words like “boarding pass,” “WestJet,” and “Milan” … to no avail. Even tried a little of my rusty High School French. Very rusty, apparently. Anyway, the ticket agent was obviously from the non-gay side of Paris because he was very cranky and gesticulated wildly for the dumb Canadians to go away.
Unsettling.
Deep breath. Find anyone who looked at all official standing around and ask them! One sent us upstairs. Those upstairs Parisians sent us downstairs. The Fitbit was humming in good humour. My husband was not.
In the end, technology saved the day when I spotted a boarding pass machine and rather effortlessly got our boarding passes. WestJet man, have a map of the airport that shows where these machines are if you will not check people all the way through, or at least let them know where to find a map. Please.
For those of you interested, you can find CDG Paris information here. At least you might know where the heck you ARE! As an added bonus, if your husband looks like he might harm you … first aid is clearly indicated.
Things got better as I picked up a “Paris” pen for my granddaughter, and we managed to make it to the departure gate on time. I was suddenly enamoured of the long layover.
Over the past two years, we have been thrust into constant risk assessment and priority-based decision-making. Decision-making strategies meant for big business moves were suddenly applied to a local hockey game, an anniversary dinner, or a vaccination.
COVID risk assessments will differ based on your age group, vaccine status, and the people you interact with (some of whom may be immune-compromised). My priorities will differ from yours. Undoubtedly.
The risk assessments have evolved as COVID and vaccine development have evolved. I turned 60 during a pandemic that had taken particular aim at my age group, my husband’s even more so. Into that realization, we strode… aware that we would minimize our contacts, wear a mask, wash our hands and all that jazz. It made sense for us. As each vaccination became available, we were first in line. We still wear a mask in some scenarios.
As travel began to open up, a long-held dream to travel to Tuscany began to peek out from under the trash heap of COVID. I wanted to go to celebrate my 60th birthday.
Now, I come as a package deal, and my husband is the most cautious being on the planet. (Sometimes annoyingly so, to be honest!) His own risk and priorities needed to be considered too.
The situation had gone around so often that we were aware that it could change again.
There were lots of reasons NOT to go. COVID had not disappeared. COVID did sometimes break through vaccines. COVID is of particular risk to those with heart disease, and the moustache guy suffered a heart attack 20 years ago. It would cost money, and I’m cheap. (Scottish, don’t ya know?)
So why go?
We are growing older. If I was 30, I might delay a little longer to feel more confident, but 30 has been doubled, and my husband is getting to the point where travel insurance will be a considerable part of trip costs.
We both enjoy hiking on our travels, but admittedly the joints are beginning to protest. We feel compelled to do as much as we can as long as we can do it! (And time is passing quicker these days!)
We are fully vaccinated, travelling to a well-vaccinated location. Why does “fully vaccinated” matter? The most concerning things about COVID are landing in ICU or dying, right? There are a LOT of COVID19 statistics on the Alberta Government COVID statistics page. Still, I focused on ICU admittance and death (per 100,000) for the vaccinated vs. the unvaccinated. (per 100,000 gives us a truer picture. Percentages for ICU and death can be misleading. Remember, percentages among completely unvaccinated come from about 9% of the 12+ population. The percentages for fully vaccinated come from about 87% of the 12+ with at least 2 doses)
Let’s have a look.
ICU hospitalizations
COVID-19 ICU admission, count and rate (per 100,000 population), in the past 120 days in Alberta by vaccine status.
Age group
3 doses & admitted in ICU (rate per 100K)
2 doses & admitted in ICU (rate per 100K)
Unvaccinated & admitted in ICU (rate per 100K)
Under 5 years
0.00
0.00
20.54
5-11 years
0.00
0.00
4.33
12-29 years
0.88
3.62
7.68
30-39 years
0.84
4.26
15.07
40-49 years
5.38
11.96
35.42
50-59 years
10.71
24.55
93.39
60-69 years
21.43
48.57
361.04
70-79 years
39.46
72.16
619.93
80+ years
26.62
70.14
97.24
Deaths
COVID-19 deaths, count and rate (per 100,000 population), in the past 120 days in Alberta by vaccine status.
Age group
3 doses & died (rate per 100K)
2 doses & died (rate per 100K)
Unvaccinated & died (rate per 100K)
Under 5 years
0.00
0.00
0.00
5-11 years
0.00
0.00
0.00
12-29 years
0.44
0.33
0.00
30-39 years
0.00
1.14
3.01
40-49 years
0.38
0.75
12.32
50-59 years
3.35
5.87
40.86
60-69 years
12.68
38.68
165.05
70-79 years
49.09
109.48
782.29
80+ years
289.12
365.71
996.66
Remember our age group? 60 – 69. This part of the decision-making matrix was pretty straightforward. Get vaccinated, especially if you want to travel.
We are travelling from Alberta, Canada, with an 87% 2-dose vaccination rate and travelling to Italy. How protected are Italians? “So far, approximately 48.6 million people in Italy have received two doses, corresponding to roughly 90.1 percent of the total population over 12 years of age. Additionally, three out of four Italians have also received the booster shot.” (Statistica.com June 2022) Seems like Italians are pretty COVID conscious, not surprising given their start to a pre-vaccine pandemic.
Alberta had lifted its mask mandate, but airports and airlines still had theirs. Italy, at the time we were planning, still had a mask mandate in public places. Overall, I felt just as safe in an airport, an airplane, in Italy, as I was at home. That said, it’s HARD to overcome 2 years of constant vigilance, isn’t it? Still, we kinda sorta started planning.
The first step was to book vacation rentals, but only those with free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead. More were available than I expected; I imagine this comes from their own adjustment to the pandemic reality. Having free cancellation certainly gave them an edge in my case.
Next, medical insurance should we become ill, and new to me…COVID pandemic insurance. A medical policy is already pricier than it used to be. We paid over a thousand bucks just for insurance, but better safe than sorry!
The rental car was also chosen for their cancellation policy. (We will get into whether this agency was the right choice later!)
During our planning, the COVID19 test requirement was removed for vaccinated travellers, with only random travellers selected. That was one less hurdle!
My son-in-law donated (paid for renovation help) Westjet miles covering one direction, so the trip would be more affordable! In addition, I was reassured by HEPA filters in Westjet’s 787 Dreamliner. We booked the flights, and yes, these were flights that could be changed.
There were extra requirements to travel in this new world. Beyond checking our passport expiry, we had to set up ArriveCan accounts and download the app. We printed our new and improved vaccine certificates with “Canada” clearly displayed. Italy also required a Passenger Locator Form, and those details were entered. We bought both N95 masks (Canadian requirement) and FFP2 (European requirement) just in case one would not accept the other.
Risk Assessment? Fairly low.
Preparedness, just in case? Yes.
Priority? We discovered a love of travel a while ago and have really been missing it. We would like to cover a long list of destinations before we can’t. This Tuscany dream has been in the lens for decades. COVID appears to be settling in, in one form or another, for a while. We are getting older. Yes, this trip was a priority.
Decision made. Off we went and have returned with no regrets at all. Was it uncomfortable to wear masks like those for 8 or 9 hours? Yes. Would I do it again? Yes!
Buon viaggio!
I’ll be taking you along on our journey in future posts. I hope that YOUR “decision-making matrix” allows you to remain as safe as you need to be while discovering those things you may still be able to do. What does that look like for you?
Not only have I not written here since April, I am guilty of many writing procrastinations. So often my writing has been influenced by the pandemic. It’s hard to avoid. I am surrounded by nurses and people who have lost families to a misinformation vortex that has left them hurt and confused. I have reached the point where it hurts too much to write about it. That concerns me but…today something else.
Below is something I wrote for what was to be the beginning of 1000 words per day. It’s been…a while. Writing is “mine” and I so very often put “mine” at the end of the list. 1000 words per day…part 1
Stephen King tells me (not personally, you understand, though that would be awesome) I should write about 1000 words per day to start. Lacking any plan, today I guess I’m writing about writing. Stephen tells me my muse will appear eventually if I show up about the same time each day so he or she (or, this being a modern society, my gender neutral muse) can know where to find me.
What is it about writing that I’ll write? It beats the heck out of me; I’m new at this.
Or am I?
For years I have been promising all those who have told me, “You should write.” that I would.
This phase of my stop and start journey has begun with the purging of my office so I can think in this space. While purging, I came across a box casually labelled as “Roxi’s writing” in black marker.
I found I had worked on a piece far more thoroughly than I had thought, and the last time I had even attempted any ‘real’ writing was in 2009. It is almost 2018. I was floored and reminded if I am ever to get this done, I need to take it seriously and make it more of a priority.
And a phone call comes, my mentally disabled brother, for whom I am guardian, has been taken to the hospital in an ambulance. I am taken away from my thoughts for a few hours while I sort out with his home and the hospital how serious it is.
Not immediately urgent.
Finally, I am here at 3:00, 2 hours past my originally planned start time.
Writing.
About writing. I can’t dredge anything else from my weary mind today.
How then do I even know I am a writer?
I write sympathy cards, encouraging notes, Facebook posts (you should see them, they are epic), and the feedback is always, “You should write” or “You have a gift with words.”
If I do, why is it so hard to develop the “what” to write? What of that Stevo? Ah, the muse, I need to find my muse or perhaps let my muse find me. I like the idea that somewhere lies something (someone?) who will move me into the ‘idea’ place to get to the ‘write about’ stage.
Do I have a life to write about? Undoubtedly. It wasn’t an easy childhood; nonetheless, I am grateful for the input of all the people around me who kept me somewhat standing (and fed and watered on occasion.) I have chosen to focus on those people rather than rest in the caustic place of my mother’s illness which would have made me bitter and ineffective. So … I am grateful…and still occasionally ineffective (Let’s be honest here…2009 since my last actual writing!)
Besides the external feedback from others, is there something within me that urges me to write?
I believe so. The thoughts rattling around my head often find their way into journals and social media. I can’t hold onto what I say whether anybody else sees it (Social Media) or not (journal). It’s like ‘verbal vomit’ but not as smelly. I get it out, and I feel better. Reading it later helps me sort things out. Or helps others sort things out if it’s addressed to them.
I was taught in one writing class to pay attention to the voice inside my head (I am not schizophrenic, for the record) and document somehow what the voice is saying. I did that for a while, carried a voice recorder with me. It was pretty grand. Little bits and pieces of things that could turn into something someday. I’m hoping today is someday. I have gradually quit listening to the voices inside my head and just blunder around from one life event to the other. I currently have some quiet time (until the money runs out), so I am trying to focus on at least attempting to write. Really write.
My nephew sent me three pictures today. He became a quadriplegic at the age of 14 and is now 34. A friend of his is having a hard time. This man has not handwritten anything for 20 years. Today he wrote her a 3-page letter of encouragement. If that won’t encourage her, I don’t know what will. If he can handwrite a three-pager after 20 years of not handwriting, this old girl can sure as hell come up with 1000 words on her computer. The gauntlet has been thrown down, and the gauntlet is enormous.
Stephen K claims his muse is a cigar-smoking fella, sort of gruff. If I were to imagine mine, I would probably imagine a slightly flaky chick, empathetic as heck, wearing colourful flowing garments, drinking wine and meditating from time to time.
Meditating, now that’s been interesting to me. I started meditating about a month ago. It taught me how noisy my head is. It’s no wonder the muse can’t get in. Man, that space is crowded! Breathe in, breathe out (I wonder what to get Bob for Christmas) Come back, breathe in, breathe out (Is that person I’m close to gay…I think they are gay…how can I help on their journey?) Come back, breathe in, breathe out. (Where will everyone sleep Christmas night…27 people!) Come back, breathe in, breathe out. I’m getting better at it, squirrel less often, and I really think it is helping me to stay in the moment a bit more. Just starting, but I hope I’m on to something.
My therapist, (yes, I have one…you guessed, didn’t you?) says my problem with staying in the moment likely comes from childhood. She could be right. I was always scanning my environment, trying to predict when the floor would fall out again and constantly having a contingency plan for when it did. On the one hand, being a planner who looks down the road and plans for the eventualities has served me well in my work world. Doing it all…the…time…however, is exhausting.
It is getting quiet, closing the door to my writing space and planning 1000 words per day. This is how it all begins. Day 1, December 11, 2017. If it’s another nine years, find me and slap me. Please.
The good news is it’s “only” been 4 years, no slap required. (A wee nudge perhaps?) How do you other writers stay on track? Please let me know!
Today I looked into the eyes of my child. (from an appropriate distance). My child has children of her own, but today she was my child. She is in pain. I want just to hold her and hold her and hold her.
I cannot.
My child is a nurse. She doesn’t work in the city Emergency Department as often as she used to. The little she is right now, is enough to hurt a skin already scraped raw. She knows others are seeing the same things, doing the same things but doing them day after day after day. Her own experience hurts—her awareness of their’s hurts her too.
There has always been trauma in Emergency. Emergency nurses know they will see traumatic things, even that they will see death. It’s an unavoidable part of the job they signed up for
But…
This is different.
As cases rise in our area and a more transmittable variant becomes ever more prevalent, COVID cases are pouring into hospitals in our area. And while age shouldn’t matter; (indeed, I said so near the beginning) https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/04/ageism/, there is something so painful about being a nurse to someone very near your age, knowing they, like you, have children at home. Knowing that in this wave, much younger people are in ICU. Knowing that much of this could have been avoided.
How do these people come to know the patient has children at home? These nurses (& their colleagues) get to know these patients more than they generally have time for. They hold their patient’s hands, sit down next to the bed and tell their patient they won’t leave them in their terror. As that patient slides into sedation, that same nurse may move to the far less human process of intubation. That shift from connected humanity is hard. So hard. Nurses and doctors are making these connections with their patients in ED, in ICU… as family members stay outside…hungry for updates. They connect with these families more than they sometimes have had to. And then they hook their recently connected patient to an ECMO machine, prone them, administer drugs, fight for their lives…often losing that fight. This third wave is even crueler. It is traumatizing, and they haven’t rested long enough.
Then they get traumatized again. Leaving work, they hear people saying the virus “isn’t real,” “just the flu,” “only sheeple believe in it”…. “Don’t get the vaccine.” Remember the story of the nurse waylaid by an anti-mask protest making her late for her ED shift? This kind of pain is visceral, and their fellow citizens are doing it to them. Some friends are doing it to them. Some family members are doing it to them. My daughter has been off social media for months because she can’t bear to see it. These people are down, and you are kicking them. You are kicking us, the families of those in health care. We look into their eyes, and we see pain. These are not superheroes; though we value them highly, they are human beings…battered human beings.
They KNOW it is real; they KNOW it is bad; they KNOW the variants are thus far worse; they KNOW it should not have happened this way.
Somehow, the wearing of a mask became enough to make people disrespect people like my daughter. My daughter…One of the ones who will hold your hand in your terror if someday this virus reaches you and takes you down a grim path. One of the ones who will update you if someday one of your loved ones takes this terrifying journey.
A doctor I admire said this, “For everyone yelling “but the Charter of Rights and Freedoms” – You might be forgetting the part it starts off with: “…subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified.” There. Are. Limits.
Dr. Fung is right. The people you are endangering also have rights; people working in health care have rights. Your rights don’t supersede theirs. If we had all worked together to stop the spread, you might already have your lives back; Dr. Fung and I may be going for dinner. I might be able to hold (and hold and hold) my daughter.
Cape Breton Trail 2019
We could be closer to the end of this pandemic. We could have been like the Atlantic provinces, whose citizens cared for each other and understood that public health restrictions were meant to protect those they held dear and those they had never laid eyes on, but loved anyway.
I’ve shown you deaths aren’t the whole story. I’ve told this story before but seeing my daughter today brought it back. Although not the entire story, I’ll end with this. COVID has killed 23,062 Canadian citizens…so far. Many more have long term effects. We are a long way from fully vaccinated; some variants are more apt to cause severe complications and cause them in younger people. For perspective, these deaths roughly equal the total deaths from —Pancreatic, Colorectal, Kidney, Breast, Cervical, Larynx, and Thyroid cancers in 2019. Imagine if we could have saved my Dad, my sister-in-law, my friend’s brother, and other mothers, fathers, sons and daughters by wearing a mask, washing our hands, social distancing?
Yesterday my husband’s family lost another one to heaven. I remember looking at my husband when he told me and thinking, “It’s going to happen more often, isn’t it?”
It is.
Today’s angel had a belly laugh that could inspire an entire room to hilarity.
Photo courtesy of Donelda’s family
I can see clearly the first time we met. I was around 19 years old. She was married to my husband’s cousin. The family was gathered around my mother-in-law’s table as they so often were. Donelda was laughing. The family was telling a joke that involved a spring-loaded ring box and D’s left breast, and she was laughing. With her entire body and soul, she was laughing.
The world will be a little less for the loss of that laugh.
The laughter came from shared memory. The whole family got the joke. They were there, and they revelled in the silly things that had happened in the past. (The stories may, or may not, have grown a little over the years.)
Those shared memories are so incredibly fun and good for the soul.
We are losing them. More and more often, we are losing them, these people who “remember when.”
I came from a family with some fragmentation, and walking into this family of shared memory was an undiluted joy.
The first time the loss of shared memory hit me was upon looking at my family’s picture and realizing I was the only one in that picture left. My half-brother remains. He is 18 years older than I and raised by my grandmother in another province, so although we have shared memories of “Granny,” we have little of shared “growing up” memories. ( I mean, he was grown up before I was born!) Although he is developmentally delayed and suffers mild dementia, I have made a point in recent years to mine him for stories about our grandparents. I have learned new things, and we have laughed a little.
He is on dialysis now. He may live some time, or he may not. This last connection to “remember when” will be a tough one to lose.
When my husband and his siblings get together, there are always stories accompanied by laughter. I envy them this. Some of those stories involve the cousin who lost his wife last night. The families lived close together and gathered regularly. (weekly, I think!) They built memories together. When they grew up and got married, they attended each other’s weddings. More story fodder created. (I seem to recall some fine wedding stories involving my husband…)
One brother-in-law had a scare with his heart last year; another is a cancer survivor. My husband has survived one heart attack. And dementia runs in this family; will some of these shared memories be lost? My sister-in-law is trying to document their history. She is blessed with distracted siblings who don’t always get her the information she needs. Lord help the woman, but I hope she gets it down and captures a bit of the essence of “them.” I have enjoyed “them.”
Lacking family, I have a friend I met when I was 11 years old: my first “real” friend, best friend…pseudo sister. We were lunatics, and the memories make us laugh. Those midnight giggling talks…she knows stuff about me that others do not. This past year has been a struggle with us landing firmly in opposite camps regarding the COVID19 pandemic. There’s a line in the sand of an almost 50-year friendship, and it breaks my heart. I hope someday we will be sharing memories again. I miss her.
Shared memory.
As soon as we can safely gather, let’s do more of this. (or let’s do it 6 feet apart in the backyard for now). Less talk of politics, less talk of today’s woes. Let’s share memories in front of the next generation, in front of those that marry into our families. Let’s soak in these moments, and when our people gain their angel wings…we will remember their laughter.
Rest easy Donelda. I’ll listen for your laughter in the summer breeze.
With Christmas recently behind us, I’ve been reflecting on the one whose birthday we were meant to be celebrating. I’ll admit I haven’t been inside a church for a while. It may have more to do with a misalignment between how I and others understood Christianity than with any loss of faith.
I am no theologian. I count among my followers, atheists, agnostics, Muslims, Hindus, evangelicals and those without labels.
I was appalled to see my brother’s church among those that filed a constitutional challenge about gathering. The youth group brought my other brother food when he fell on hard times. They sang at his funeral. How could they get it so right…and then so wrong?
This church has been offering online church for months so I was rather blown away to be honest. My brother misses people at church but this aging man with a developmental disability UNDERSTANDS. For the record, Jesus gathered wherever the people were. The people are at home, or should be. WWJD in 2020? Zoom Church? I think so.
Jesus said, “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there among them” (Matthew 18:20) Not four, not ten, not 100, not 500. TWO or THREE. If you live alone, gathering via Zoom WORKS! Stand down churches. Your larger responsibility is to your community as a whole.
There are lessons attributed to Jesus Christ that hurt none of us to consider. Whether you believe he is the son of God, a prophet or a wise man roaming the countryside, this one benefits all of us.
“And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-39)
All of you…believers, non-believers, those of different faiths…
Love. Thy. Neighbour.
Thy Neighbour with COVID.
Thy Neighbour over 60.
Thy Neighbour with Co-morbidities.
Thy Neighbour working in health care.
Thy Neighbour who has been denied our usual grieving comforts and rituals.
Love Them.
On November 4th I asked for love for our ageing neighbours.
On November 7th, days after my daughter’s birthday, I asked you to love her and her colleagues. For Dr. Markland and his ICU compatriots, I asked my community to care for them. They are your neighbours too.
“We saw it in Italy with military trucks hauling away bodies, with Italian doctors and nurses having to choose who received care (and who did not) based on survival probability. Many didn’t “make the list.” These weren’t all COVID patients. Patients with other situations were hitting those hospitals at the same time. Triage, I imagine, was a nightmare.”
On November 11th, I honoured our veterans, many of them seniors, by asking my community to love these heroic neighbours, saying,
“As deaths in long-term care once again reach a crisis point, as we in Alberta break hospitalization and ICU records, there are undoubtedly some veterans or those who love them, among the statistics.”
On November 27th, I tried to shine a light on just how many of us, how many of our neighbours, have “co-morbidities”… how many of us are at risk.
“Dr. Hinshaw said that having a chronic medical condition is quite common, with nearly a quarter of Albertans over 20 living with a medical condition. (Almost 800,000 people) Ten percent of Albertans have two conditions, and eight percent have three or more—conditions like hypertension, heart disease and diabetes.
Hypertension is found in 87 percent of Albertans who died of COVID19. Almost 70 percent of Albertan men over 65 have high blood pressure. (My hubby, the moustache guy, is in this group). Having co-morbidities does not equal at death’s door.”
As we enter into a new year, hope lies on the horizon in a vial of vaccine. I ask again, “Love thy neighbour.” The vaccine rollout will take a while before it gets to all of us, and until it does, there continues to be a risk of spread. Health care workers and senior home residents come first, which will hopefully drive our mortality rates down significantly.
BUT
Many seniors and those with co-morbidities live in the community and will be waiting a while yet.
During this holiday week, the province reports approximately 1300 new cases. Of those, the WHO estimates about 5% become critically ill. We’ve consistently had around 1200 new cases per day over the last week or so. (Other than one low testing rate day) So we are looking at 48 – 65 people becoming critically ill each day. It is important to remember the cumulative effect. Those entering the hospital are added to people already there. Those in ICU will be there for a while; even once out of ICU, they will use significant resources. (See the November 7th blog for Dr. Markland’s overview of the possible resources required)
As of our last update a few days ago we have 921 in hospital (average age 63, range 0 – 104)
Average age for COVID cases hospitalized with an ICU stay is 59 years making me REALLY excited about that upcoming birthday (range: 0-89)
A total of 1046 deaths. (average age 82, range 23 – 107
23 is younger than our youngest death was previously…
The deaths matter. Every single one.
Deaths
November 4th
Dec 31
Age 20 to 29
2
4
Age 30 to 39
2
6
Age 40 to 49
3
10
Age 50 to 59
8
23
Age 60 to 69
26
100
Age 70 to 79
79
211
80 +
223
691
While deaths in younger folks are rising, most alarming to me is that folks in my husband’s age group have now hit triple digits. And those “Aged” folks? The ones many don’t think matter, mattered to someone … and this is not an easy way to go.
And our neighbours working in health care…it’s gotten harder.
Dr. Markland’s ICU team in Edmonton is well beyond capacity now. Calgary hospitals are also beginning to see strain. He is regularly working 36 hour shifts. He is an empathetic soul. That’s a tough thing to be these days.
“It’s easy to turn this pandemic into numbers, but it’s so much more than that. These are mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers. That tickle you feel in your throat is how it started for them. Their death leaves scars.” Dr. Darren Markland
ICU admissions
November 7th
Dec. 31
Under 1 year
7
1 – 9 years
1
4
10 – 19 years
4
8
20 – 29 years
8
21
30 – 39 years
11
30
40 – 49 years
22
62
50 – 59 years
41
118
60 – 69 years
56
183
Dr. Daisy Fung has been hurting from the deaths in the LTC homes she covers. Her tweets give us insight on how the world looks from her vantage point.
“I had to tell a child that they had lost BOTH parents today. That was the start of my day. There were similar calls made. People think Christmas is stolen bc they can’t go shopping? I break news regularly that Christmas is devastated for families, stolen from patients.”
On December 5th she wrote,
“Words I heard today: ‘I wish I knew #COVID19 was serious. I now know & will tell everybody.’ Said as I keep their loved one comfortable as they die of COVID.
Albertans need to get it straight that it’s serious, we need to protect our vulnerable. Now.”
Yesterday she shared her joy about vaccines for these people.
“Ended work for 2020 by giving orders for all my #LongTermCare patients to receive the #Moderna#COVID19#vaccine. Ended 2020 with a prescription for hope, provided by a feat of science and medicine. It’s kind of perfect”.
There are real people behind available” beds” and these people are becoming decimated by the constant struggle, the constant death of their patients.
If you can’t find it in yourself to love thy aged neighbours, your veteran neighbours, your neighbours with co-morbidities, your healthcare neighbours, I know you love someone.
Risking further strain on our healthcare system can affect any of your neighbours. It can affect you.
The same healthcare workers who accept COVID patients right now are those you will need if you have a heart attack, a severe car accident, a diabetic coma…that your child might need. While COVID mostly minimally impacts children, if they show up at an Edmonton ER for any issue, you want them to be cared for. Note that the Stollery Children’s Hospital is using space for adult patients and double-bunking kids.
There wouldn’t be room for you to stay the night and hold your child’s hand (or puke bucket…let’s get real…been there).
A situation like we are currently experiencing holds potential to affect every corner of our community and our lives.
When our neighbours get cancer, there’s little we can do to slow the spread.
In this, we have an opportunity. A Merry Christmas. A Happy New Year. A chance to really matter.
An opportunity to save lives.
Loving our neighbour is such a simple way to do it. #StayHome #WashYourHands #SkipHawaii
We’ve heard a lot about COVID patients with comorbidities in the last while. Alberta’s government has shared data on how many people who have died from COVID also had comorbidities. An Alberta MP went so far as to point out that only ten people with no co-morbidities have died…
As if comorbidities were something rare in Alberta.
There you are, saying, “GREAT!” as you count yourself among the “non-comorbid.”
Here’s the thing.
My husband would have counted himself among those with no comorbidities back in late November 2003. He had just had a physical and was given a clean bill of health.
On December 3rd, he had a heart attack at the age of 49, entering a club that, in our COVID19 world, has become just a little more undesirable.
The club is not as exclusive as you might think. On November 20th, our Chief Medical Officer of Health told Albertans a little about comorbidities. It became clearer that if not us, many we love, may belong to Club Co-Morb.
Dr. Hinshaw said that having a chronic medical condition is quite common, with nearly a quarter of Albertans over 20 living with a medical condition. (Almost 800,000 people) Ten percent of Albertans have two conditions, and eight percent have three or more—conditions like hypertension, heart disease and diabetes.
Hypertension is found in 87 percent of Albertans who died of COVID19. Almost 70 percent of Albertan men over 65 have high blood pressure. (My hubby, the moustache guy, is in this group)
Having comorbidities does not equal “at death’s door.”
The moustache guy is an active Grandpa, goes hiking in our nearby Rocky Mountains, and often helps our kids out with household projects.
This project left him with some handy equipment…perhaps he can get us some groceries?
The moustache, and the man it’s attached to, have a lot of living to do. Chances are you know someone with a comorbidity that doesn’t show. It’s misleading to see “the person who died had co-morbidities” and discount the risk of COVID.
All you need to know is this. The person who died has people who miss them. That’s all we, the public, should be focusing on here. Unless, of course, you have high blood pressure, diabetes and the like, then you should probably take extra precautions.
But so should everyone else, really.
Let’s take care of each other.
Dr. Hinshaw also recently reminded us that “Severe outcomes are not limited to those already at the end of their lives, and it’s a mistake to think so. About one in four people who need to be hospitalized and one in six who are in ICU do not have any pre-existing medical conditions.”
Dr. Raj Bhardwaj, a Calgary physician, seconds Dr. Hinshaw’s thoughts and says those statistics don’t tell the whole story. He says that some of the most common comorbidities in those who have died of COVID19 are conditions that hundreds of thousands of Albertans have. Bhardwaj says the cases and deaths should not be just statistics, either.
“People die of COVID19, not of their comorbidities.” Dr. Bhardwaj went on to say, “If you’re crossing the street and somebody hits you with their car, we don’t say, ‘Oh, it’s okay, that person had diabetes.’ It’s the car hitting you that kills you.” (via Jordan Kanygin CTV News Calgary)
COVID19 is the car; when it hits you, it could kill you.
“We can’t let the numbers dehumanize the people who are dying here – the friends and the family members who are dying of COVID” ~ Dr. Raj Bhardwaj November 2020
Today we honoured veterans, including those from World War II and the Korean War. I hesitated to intrude on this day with another blog post but watching the surviving veterans compelled me to say something about what we owe them.
Approximately 33,000 Second World War veterans are still alive, with an average age of 94. 6400 Korean veterans remain with an average age of 87. (Veterans Affairs – Demographics)
These folks are “old,” those that many in society devalue and say should stay locked up at home, so younger people don’t have to wear a mask into a store.
As young men, these guys went to war against a tangible threat.
The veterans interviewed today and telling their stories were young men once, as the ones we lost forever will be.
Louis Dautremont, lost in the Netherlands, age 25, April 21, 1945
As Robert Laurence Binyon wrote in his 1914 poem,
“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not wear them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them. “
My daughter bringing an Afghanistan veteran into our family truly brought home how young those lost were, how much life they had to live.
Some came home and carried on with their lives, though often not without significant scars from the battles they fought. Globe and Mail’s Les Perreaux paid tribute in 2016 to 31 of the then 70 Afghanistan veterans who lost their lives to suicide after returning home, in his article The Unremembered.
I have no doubt we lost some the same way in those earlier wars.
Those that survived World War II and the psychological aftermath are among the seniors most at risk for serious complications and death from COVID 19.
These people went to war for our country…
to protect others…
I think it’s time we return the favour.
Let’s protect these strong (but vulnerable) soldiers of our country. Let’s protect the partners who waited for them to come home. Don’t let them die in such a horrific way after what they have given.
To reference Mr. Binyon,
They have grown old,
Age has worn them; the years have condemned,
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them too.
As deaths in long-term care once again reach a crisis point, as we in Alberta break hospitalization and ICU records, there are undoubtedly some veterans or those who love them, among the statistics.
217 in hospital (average age 62 years – range 0 – 102)
46 in intensive care (average age 60 years -range 4 – 89)
7 new deaths reported, 383 total (average age 82 years – range 27 to 106)
Pay tribute to these veterans.
Wash Your Hands
Stay Home if Ill
Sanitize Surfaces
Social Distance
Wear a Mask Indoors Where Social Distancing is Difficult.
They protected us. It’s now our turn, and our honour, to protect them.
Alberta hit 919 cases today. We don’t know our hospitalizations or ICU admissions currently; our system is experiencing technical difficulties at an inconvenient time. (My experience with technical difficulties is that’s ALWAYS when they hit.)
We had five additional deaths reported…
These deaths are a tragedy, no matter their age, no matter the circumstance. If you’ve lost someone, you know, it’s a tragedy for these five families.
Death is the most tragic part of this illness.
We know we will add deaths to our COVID total if this continues. We need to know we may have additional deaths from other causes too, unless we get this under control.
Let’s talk about our health system.
Anyone keeping track of your province’s Chief Medical Officer of Health (or their equivalent elsewhere) has heard about “overwhelming the health system.”
We saw it in Italy with military trucks hauling away bodies, with Italian doctors and nurses having to choose who received care (and who did not) based on survival probability. Many didn’t “make the list.” These weren’t all COVID patients. Patients with other situations were hitting those hospitals at the same time. Triage, I imagine, was a nightmare.
We saw it again in New York. Bodies were stored in refrigerated trucks when the morgue and funeral homes ran out of room for the bodies.
Mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, sons and daughters…in a reefer van
(via CTV news)
And here we are. We are talking about an “overwhelming” of the system here in my home province. The metropolitan city north of me is feeling the strain. As of a couple of days ago, 30 percent of non-urgent and elective surgeries in Edmonton have been postponed for the foreseeable future to ensure hospitals have the capacity to withstand any outbreaks.
Calgary, just 25 minutes from my town, is bracing itself. ICU departments are holding emergency meetings because (typical of 2020) ICU departments are already experiencing higher than normal levels of NON-COVID ICU admissions…and the COVID wave is headed their way. Of the 919 cases today, some proportion will hit the Emergency Department; will go to acute care, others to ICU. Again, our data has not been updated for current numbers, but this is what I have.
The age breakdown for total COVID ICU admissions we have to this point is:
1 – 4 years – 1 admission
10 – 19 years– 4 admissions
20 – 29 years – 8 admissions
30 – 39 years – 11 admissions
40 – 49 years – 22 admissions
50 – 59 years – 41 admissions
60 – 69 years 56 admissions
70 – 79 years – 49 admissions
80 + years – 21 admissions
(Looks like my husband’s age group is winning the ICU lottery…)
The last current data we have is 171 COVID patients in hospital including 33 in ICU. 9 hospitals have outbreaks.
Resources for ICU are expensive, but it doesn’t stop there for those that recover, especially older patients.
Dr. Darren Markland, an ICU doc in Edmonton, took to Twitter to share some information on COVID ICU admissions for older patients. (shared with permission from @drdagly) We know mortality is high for this demographic, Dr. Markland shared that should someone over 80 need ICU, their mortality pushes 80%.
“Consequently, they rarely are admitted to ICU. This means:
ICU occupancy lags hospital admission rates significantly and is an insensitive metric for healthcare capacity and strain.
These are preventable deaths that take a significant number of quality years with them. “
Dr. Markland also points to the weeks of treatment required for these sickest patients.
He talks additionally about those that survive the ICU and how they continue to need augmented support in the hospital for an extended duration. Physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and nutritional support. If not cared for, he says they can end up back in this rapidly filling ICU.
Finally, Dr. Markland tells us,
“This situation is preventable. Our hospitalization numbers are a serious warning that mandatory measures are needed now. But while we wait for direction. Please do not go to work if you are sick. No more in-person parties until there is a vaccine. Wear your mask around people.”
He ends with…
In the middle of this, people in healthcare are stressed by a government that has chosen this particular time to address health care costs. I’m a fiscal conservative; I get it. The old Alberta Advantage seems to be a page in history. However, our health minister appears to be hesitant to collaborate with doctors for cost savings, refused arbitration and ended their contract early. He’s announcing layoffs of the very people specifically trained to clean to COVID protocols (while hiring private folks without that training). It looks like he’s eliminated overtime at a time when health professionals need to use it the most, needing to cover shifts for those self-isolating, caring for kids who are isolating…becoming ill.
Before the second wave of COVID19 completely hits our health system, we have a group of fragile people on the front line.
They are already tired.
Our government has put the burden on us to try to turn this tide. Many people posit that the government should be doing more. It’s a hard call to make. There’s no question the spring shut down negatively affected business owners across the province; many closed. Most restaurants have done a stellar job of adopting COVID protocols to keep their customers safe, and very few infections have come from those types of gatherings. Is it fair then to shut down a restaurant owner, many who operate on the thinnest of margins at the best of times? Maybe not. I don’t have the answer.
Personal responsibility, however, has led us to 919 cases in one day. We don’t appear to be a very responsible lot. Why? Again, it probably relates in a big way that it’s mostly “old people” who die. Here’s where I say,
If you can’t get behind saving the lives of the aged, could you get behind saving the lives of the general public who may suffer harm from an overwhelmed system?
Can I appeal to you to “protest” for our health care workers by protecting them from this onslaught? Is wearing a mask, sticking to your own household, sanitizing etc. harder than walking a picket line? Maybe not.
Is it more meaningful at this moment in time than honking your horn as you go by or clapping for them as they leave the hospital?
I daresay, your actions to bend the curve on this thing will be the single most loving and impactful thing you do for our health care workers.
I know. I love a couple and hold the rest in my heart.
It’s been a good long while since I put up a blog. I’ve had something to say but honestly was reeling at the idea that it had to be said. And it was going to be so darn long.
Let’s talk about ageism.
I always knew it was a bit of a “thing.” Sure.
But COVID has brought to light the fact that our seniors are incredibly devalued in our society. It isn’t helped by an Alberta premier who declares in the legislature,
“It is critical as we move forward that we focus our efforts on the most vulnerable, on the elderly and the immunocompromised,” adding that “the average age of death from COVID in Alberta is 83 and I remind the house that the average life expectancy in the province is age 82.”
Factually accurate at the time (we now have an average COVID death of 82), it was nonetheless unsettling. That average age of death includes people aged 27 to 105, remember. Every one of them matters to me. Let’s look at COVID deaths in our province. Out of 318 deaths:
2 were age 20 to 29
2 were age 30 – 39
3 were age 40 – 49
Then we see things begin to climb a bit, around triple for each decade older:
8 were 50 – 59 (Hello Granny18, mild asthmatic)
26 were 60-69 (Hello Grandpa18, heart attack survivor)
79 were 70-79
And yes,
223 were over 80
So he’s not wrong; it does affect the elderly more than the rest of the population. Now let’s unpack,
“…It’s critical we focus our efforts on the most vulnerable, on the elderly and the immunocompromised.” Many people have taken that to mean that anyone over 60 should stay home for months while they blithely go about their lives. This guy. Stay home for months, stay away from our family.
The “elderly” go hiking.
Me too, because I can’t bring it home to him right?
They attack me when I suggest those people have a right to feel safe in the community, feel that their community might be interested in protecting them as much as they are able, help THEM to continue living THEIR lives. Yes, we’ll act responsibly in our actions to protect ourselves, but help a sister out, okay? I’ve been accused of being “scared” and told to “go hide.”
I’m not scared when I put a seatbelt on, and I expect others to belt up too. I’m not scared when I don’t drink and drive, and I expect others to do the same.
To protect others.
One fella posited that drunk driving killed more people than COVID has. He was in the U.S., so I looked up the U.S. numbers. 10,000 people were killed by drunk driving in 2018 versus 229,000 U.S. COVID deaths as of this writing. Why is it that people are okay with drunk driving laws but think a mask or gathering restrictions are horrific? Why? Because it’s mostly “old people” who are dying.
Damn it. Old people hold our history; they hold so much wisdom we could learn from; I love several of them and lost several “too soon.”
Who are these “old people”?
My husband is 66. Please don’t make him the 26th death in his age group.
Don’t write off someone’s Dad, Mom, Grandpa, Grandma because they are over 70 or 80 or 90 or even, by jove, 100.
70’s
My Dad, a huge volunteer with the Alberta Council on Aging while still running a company, died from Cancer at 76. The Premier of our Province presented him with a volunteer award just four months before he died. In the month before his death, he received the Queens Jubilee medal to recognize his efforts for his community. I still remember thinking he had so much left to do.
My brother in law retired from politics at the age of 70.
80’s
Rachel Wyatt published her first novel at the age of 82. I have an article about her up on my bulletin board to remind me there’s still time to get my book published.
An Ontario man named Bill Wall began riding in the Ride to Conquer Cancer in his early 80’s. He rides tandem because Bill is blind.
90’s
Bill turned 92 this year. He is still riding in the Ride to Conquer Cancer, raising $21,168 for Cancer.
Byrony Burrell is a 94-year-old British Twitter phenom (@lifeofbryony) with 67,000 followers. She shares humour,
“If I could go back in time to 1947 when I was 21 and speak to myself about life in 2020, the talk of a global virus would probably scare my younger self less than hearing her older self describing talking to a doorbell, surfing nets and webs on an apple and typing on tablets.”
And wisdom,
“You know nothing about a person when you first meet them. You may see age, race, gender or clothing, but what does that really tell you? Nothing. Assumptions pop into your head because your brain likes to categorize things, but that way of thinking limits your outlook on life.”
100
Her countryman Captain Tom celebrated his upcoming 100th birthday by setting a goal to raise money for the National Health Service during the onset of the pandemic. The Captain walked the length of his garden back and forth 100 times, in 10 lap increments, assisted by his walker. He planned to complete the laps by his 100th birthday on April 30. His goal was 1000 pounds. Cute right? 24 hours later, he had raised the equivalent of 11,666 Canadian dollars. As his fundraiser wrapped up, Captain Tom had raised almost 33 million pounds (almost 57 million Canadian Dollars.)
100-year-old Captain Tom was knighted for his efforts. The youngster who laid the sword upon his shoulder was the 94-year-old Queen of England.
Some seniors are in care, who won’t be able to hike, volunteer, write novels, join Twitter or even do laps in the garden. They matter too. We owe it to them for what they did for us before their minds or bodies gave out. My mother in law was a phenom, walking every day and babysitting Great-grandchildren into her 70’s. Dementia found her. She was still valuable to our family. We remembered all her years of helping us, and dementia brought us the unexpected gift of her talking more about the war years in England.
Will many of these people over 80 have died anyway? Maybe. But not like this. Not. Like. This.
This is not a painless slipping into the night, and they deserve better from us.
Alberta cases are rising rather alarmingly these days, with Edmonton already cancelling elective surgeries as they near capacity. Yesterday’s report from our Chief Medical Officer Health told us we had 15 deaths since Friday. We added 581 cases on October 30, 525 October 31, 592 November 1, 570 November 2. More concerning for me are the increases in hospitalizations and ICU admittance. Alberta overall has 167 (27 in ICU) in hospital, 100 of those in the Edmonton zone. What we need to worry about is two weeks out. A majority of the cases have untraceable origins. Someone out there spread it, and we don’t know who they are or who they were in contact with.
The young won’t necessarily be alarmed, but they should be. Although the young rarely die unless they have comorbidities, it does happen. Even those with a mild case are still sometimes taking a long time to get back to their pre-COVID selves. This thing spreads so easily. We have outbreaks in hospitals and nursing homes despite extreme measures to prevent spread. One nursing home outbreak was traced back to a family gathering. Dr. Hinshaw once said we shouldn’t fear COVID, but we should RESPECT it.
What does respect look like?
Stay home if you’re sick.
Limit your circle.
Practice Physical Distancing.
Wear a mask where physical distancing might prove difficult.
Sanitize or wash your hands frequently.
Try not to touch your face.
Sanitize high touch surfaces regularly.
It’s such a simple way to show respect for the seniors in your community.
The kindness themes for the past few weeks have revolved around being present in our interactions with others, finding good homes for things we no longer need and being kind to yourself.
The one that resonated was “Be Present.”
One of the unexpected gifts of this COVID19 physical distancing is a renewed connection in some relationships. We used to be next to each other regularly, checking our phones while talking, focused on what was coming next instead of the moment in front of us.
That precious moment.
If we had known how long it would be before we’d be sharing dinner again, hugging good-bye, having a long face to face conversation…might we have been more in tune with each other? In that moment?
When we get together for our social distanced visits now, we listen more than we used to. We are aware of each other as we never were before.
Nobody checks their phones as we talk. (Though there is some distraction caused by the kids at times…)
Every visit with my children ends with eye contact, real eye contact, and I’ve discovered there are messages in those eyes that speak to, and heal my heart and theirs.
I ache to hug again. Children, grandchildren, friends. It will be a prolonged hug; I am certain. I am hopeful we will end those hugs when they return, with eye contact … exchanging messages between our souls.
The Theme for Week 16 of The Kindness Project is “Stop Comparing Yourself”.
The Kindness book speaks about focusing less on external things and more on our own hearts and minds, worrying less about whether we’re “better than” or “less than” the people in our circles. Those of us following the “Social Distancing” protocol pretty closely would, you might imagine, have an easy time not comparing ourselves to others when we only see our own families every day.
But, at times of isolation like these, we are drawn to Social Media, especially Twitter and Facebook, to find information, to connect, to find some small part of this we can control. What we see instead is a myriad of misinformation and panic-inducing partial data and…a few people who seem to be doing self-isolation just a bit more creatively than we are.
As if the mere fact of being apart from loved ones, being unable to enjoy a hike in the forest a change in work or loss of income wasn’t enough to cause depression, here’s another factor.
Research has shown a link between social media and depression brought on by comparing our lives to someone else’s.
We can’t control being apart, being banned from provincial parks or our employment situation. Still, we CAN be selective in our social media exposure, and when we do engage, be mindful of what we are thinking when looking at someone else’s posts. It’s important to remember that what they are showing you is the BEST version of their lives. They don’t post themselves weeping in frustration, close-ups of their wrinkles or the explosion of temper their frustration brought them. (You don’t know my dark…or wrinkly…side…) Not because those things aren’t real, but because it’s not what we post on a platform like Facebook. Kind of like the old Christmas letter, we left out the embarrassing bits.
Twitter runs its own risks as misinformation is RAMPANT. I’m beginning to realize I need to get information only from reliable sources and quit reading the comments. QUIT READING THE COMMENTS!! You will be tempted to correct someone sharing some misinformation, but you will NEVER WIN!
I tried. I’m exhausted.
On Twitter, a comparison might just be okay. I’m feeling comparatively intelligent these days…
If you’ve come to me via social media, know this, if you are doing your best, if you skid to the end of the day alive, you are doing just fine in these tumultuous times. You’re doing okay, friends. Just keep doing it another day.
And another.
And another.
One of these days, we’ll lay some face to face love on those social media friends, those who seem to be perfect, those who seem to be losing their minds, because deep down, we know all of us are just doing our best to be…”okay”.
Not long ago, I was blogging about a Kindness Project. I left off at Week 7 and 8. The next post was a bit of middle of the night COVID anxiety but I think it’s well time I started focusing on kindness again. I’ve been going over our weeks since then and reflecting on Jamie Thurston’s book,Kindness the Little Thing that Matters Most, and how it has lessons to teach us, especially in times like these. From where I left off, until today, our world has been changed.
Credit Michael de Adder Halifax Chronicle Herald March 24, 2020. Follow Michael on twitter @deAdder
Week 9
February 23 – 29
“Pay for Someone’s Journey”
By the end of February, COVID19 had exited Asia, travelled within Europe and had now landed in North America. At this point, all cases in Canada related to travel outside of the country. It became a certainty that I wouldn’t be paying for any journeys outside of Canada, for a while.
My son and his family had a Disneyland trip booked for the end of May. If they lose anything in having to cancel the trip…I guess I’ll help them out a bit with that journey when they can finally take it. “Pay for Someone’s Cancelled Journey” is still kindness.
Week 10
March 1 – 7
“Remember Where You Came From (and where you are going)”
This theme stresses empathy for the different places people might be in their lives. The young families, like we once were, the seniors in long term care as we will someday be. The same day the first case was announced in Alberta, the first community transmission in Canada recorded, my niece had her first baby. I reached out to her and tried to support her from a distance as neither of us were comfortable with visitors to wee Parker. We still haven’t cuddled my great-nephew. We knew my brother, who passed away in 2004, would miss the opportunity for that cuddle. We didn’t think we would.
The age demographic of COVID’s victims across the world was heavily into the senior years. My husband turned 65 last year; I’m approaching 60. Although not the highest risk, our daughter, as a nurse, was starting to think about the possibilities of poor outcomes due to age and the “co-morbidities” of heart disease and asthma.
We thought about the lost wisdom as so many seniors fell to the disease around the world.
Week 11
March 8 – 14
“Be A Seat Vigilante”
This section resonated in an entirely different way than it would have before March 2020. The book talks about giving up your seat to someone who might need it more than you. At this point, Alberta’s cases were returning travellers, but our observations of other countries made us wary. My ED nurse daughter had now asked us to stay home. She was actively planning for the virus to arrive and knew enough about it that she didn’t want us out and about. Universities in Alberta began to cancel their lectures due to class sizes.
“Giving up your seat to someone who needs it more than you”…started to become “giving up your activities to save someone more vulnerable than you.”
Week 12
March 15 to 21
“Apologize”
I had my final outing on March 16. My brother was having a procedure done at a hospital in Calgary, and as his guardian, I was there to support him and sign his documentation. My daughter works at this hospital, and she popped up to hug her uncle. I asked for a hug too because we just didn’t know when the next hug would be.
Alberta got our first case of “community transmission” this week, bringing anxiety levels a little higher.
On my way home, I picked up prescriptions to limit excursions, and the Costco was insanely busy. We were hearing about “social distancing,” and running the gauntlet to the pharmacy in that crowd had me thinking it was time to change pharmacies. I apologized as I asked people to move aside to let me through, and as I spoke with the pharmacist, I had a feeling that a lot of people would be subjecting her to some behaviour that should get her an apology. The stress was evident. I wished her well, apologizing in my head on behalf of any who would not show her patience over the next while.
People would begin working from home this week and attempt to homeschool their kids as classrooms shuttered their doors. Recreation facilities would close, gatherings above 50 people were not recommended, and a state of health emergency was declared. Our first COVID19 death was recorded this week.
There was not going to be much room for patience.
Week 13
March 22 to 28
“Be Nice to Parking Attendants”
The message here was, “When we judge people by their profession, we cease to see them as individuals.”
By March 27, we had started to see closures of non-essential services. Who was staying open? Grocery Stores. Trucking Companies. Food Delivery, the people getting us fed and making sure we got our essentials. Suddenly, jobs with little social standing were “essential,” grocery clerks, truckers and delivery drivers were lauded as heroes as they placed themselves “out there” while we stayed safely home.
Be kind if you are in the grocery store even as you feel the stress brought by waiting in line, one way aisles and picked over shelves.
Buy a trucker a cup of coffee and a meal at a drive through. Give them the fist pump for an airhorn blast. (My husband was a trucker for a while. Trust me he LOVED when the kids did that!)
Yell, “Thank you!!” to the delivery driver (from a distance) when he drops your online order at the door.
We are all in a better place than we would be if not for our new heroes. Be kind.
Week 14
March 29 – April 4
“Speak Up”
Be strong for those who can’t be, and a voice for those who need it.
This week there were 20 patients hospitalized in Alberta, 8 in ICU and another death. It was time to “speak up,” and what we began saying was, “stay home if you can, wash your hands frequently, practice social distancing.” We were speaking up for our elders, for our immunocompromised, for those with pre-existing conditions…protecting them by staying home.
Week 15
April 5 – 10
“Share Good News”
We needed this more than ever, as day after day, we have been subjected to constant coverage of skyrocketing death tolls in Europe, New York City and a creeping of death tolls in Canada. What’s the GOOD news?
I guess the good news is the concerts put out on Twitter by celebrities and choirs, the puppy videos, the hilarious isolation challenges.
For some reason, more than one family member sent me the video of a couple of seniors trying to catch snow in their mouths as their garage door opened…thinking it might be an activity we could do. Lord knows we can’t sing.
The good news is people seeing truckers and cashiers recognized as essential, health care workers receiving ovations and lights and sirens drive-bys as they change shifts.
The good news is the creativity coming out of people stranded at home.
The good news is the discovery that the human touch is a superpower. We didn’t know it was a superpower. Now we do, and boy will that superpower be launched in full force when the time comes.
The good news is my son’s test for COVID 19 has come back negative. His wife and I have never been so happy to see a man-cold.
The good news is…this will end, and many of us will be changed for the better.
Occasionally nothing gets written when I can’t think of anything to say. These last few weeks, while it is true, nothing has been written, this time it’s because I have too MUCH going on in my head, and I haven’t known where to begin.
The doodle on this page was done around 1 a.m. as I tried to “capture” some of the thoughts clanging around in my head so I could sleep.
First thoughts were for my daughter, an Emergency Nurse, running INTO the fire of COVID 19 while the rest of us shelter.
Secondly, my daughter, a mother, working long hours and not seeing much of her kids. There may come the point where she will have to isolate herself from her kids and her husband. These little ones age 1, 3 and 5 will wonder where she’s gone.
Lastly, the two groups of people who will influence the conditions my daughter will face.
Will she work in an overwhelmed health system making decisions such as Italy has had to make, around WHO to treat, rather than HOW to treat?
Will she become ill herself from ongoing exposure to the virus? Admittedly this is probably more a matter of “when” than “if.”
Will she be among the health workers that have…died?
Who influences these outcomes the most?
Me.
You.
We can be people who chose to ignore recommendations from our Chief Medical Officer and don’t practice social distancing. We can contribute to an exponential spread of the virus and a health system unable to keep up with the onslaught. We can be those who pour fuel on the fire my daughter and her colleagues must enter.
Or, we can be people who chose to follow recommendations from our Chief Medical Officer. Don’t visit, keep our distance while out and don’t go out and about unless we need to. We can decelerate the fire my daughter and her colleagues must enter.
Being apart is hard, so hard, I get it. My further away grandkids were coming for their first sleepover last weekend. It had to be cancelled. An Instagram video call had to suffice. We have been babysitting the closer grandkids once a week and were really starting to settle in and enjoy this scheduled time. That, too, is gone for now. For them, it was a Facetime chat that will have to be enough.
The worst part is all the unknowns. How long? How bad? I’m a planner, and it seems there is nothing I can do.
But
I CAN stay in as much as possible, get my groceries delivered, do the video calls. It is my contribution to saving our health care workers from the horror experienced in Italy.
We had warning; there’s no excuse for us allowing this to happen. As people, as a government, as a country…as a society.
May you all stay well. Those of us 50 and up have an increased risk of complications and death; those 65 and up even more so. If you have people in your life who are immunocompromised (as I do), they are also at significant risk, no matter how young they are.
As my daughter and I exchanged, “I miss you” messages, I promised her a party when it’s all over.
“You’ll come over for dinner; we’ll eat all kinds of “sh*t” we shouldn’t. You’ll drink too much wine and have to stay over. In the morning, we’ll have mimosas and waffles (with bacon!) for brunch.
It’s a date. We don’t know THE date, but it’s a date.
I’ve still been on board the kindness train the last couple of weeks, still a “Kindness Ambassador” as described in my last post, “The Kindness Project”
I thought of several people in my circle who could surely use some kind thoughts…and then I “met” Candice George @candiceaartist on twitter. Candice is Wetsuwetsen. You may have heard of the Wetsuwetsen people in the last couple of weeks. Protesters. Against a pipeline. The media was focusing only on these protesters who opposed the pipeline and out of the chaos came a young woman attempting to bring a voice to the majority in her community who supported economic development and sought a peaceful resolution with those opposed.
We all have our reasons for supporting or not supporting either side of this issue and there have certainly been “unkind” thoughts all over twitter. Through it all, Candice has remained calm and tried to share another view to Canadians. I came to respect her and her approach. At one point, Candice was attacked by someone claiming her followers were white supremacists. (For real)
To which I replied,
“Sweetheart, I’m a white, rather supreme, Grandma to 6 grandchildren and 1 great-grandchild who carry indigenous blood. This Supreme White lady thanks you for being a positive role model.”
Was that kind to throw a lighthearted thought her way amid a trying time? Perhaps.
What was REALLY kind was her response.
❤ Snachaliyah “I honour you for honouring me!” Keep on rocking as a supreme atsoo!!
We were kind to each other. One “settler”, one “indigenous”… kind to each other as human beings. While presenting her elder’s side of the story I have yet to hear her swear or call another disrespectful names. This REALLY stands out on twitter, especially when in dialogue about such contentious issues.
Support her side of the story or not, this is a stellar human being, and she should be admired for her leadership. Be kind to Candice, or you’ll have to go through the supreme atsoo!
Week 8’s kindness theme hits closer to home. “Give a gift to a local school.”
I send plenty of money to local schools with 18 grandchildren passing through with various fundraisers. I eat a lot of cookie dough, popcorn, pies, pizza and chocolate, own a variety of cards and Christmas wrap. I wanted to do something unique to this week, though and chose Breakfast Club Canada who is active in High River. I had to fend for myself sometimes as a kid, and I know that there’s an impact when kids aren’t well fed. Turns out soda crackers and peanut butter isn’t exactly rocket fuel…and some kids show up at school with less than that. You can’t think of anything else when you’re hungry, so I’m hoping my wee contribution will help a kid through.
The book I’m hoping to publish by the time I’m 80 (It’s good to have goals) talks about the villagers who kept me afloat during my “fending for myself” moments. Now I’m a villager and I hope it helps.
Tell me what you have done, or would do following the week 7 and 8 markers. I’d love to hear from you!
Black Friday. The real sign that we have swung into the Christmas season. As we are inundated by appeals from the Mustard Seed and Salvation Army among others, the dream I had last night isn’t all that surprising. I was at a Tim Hortons (how very Canadian of me) and a down and out fellow shuffled into the place and rattled enough change onto the counter to buy a large double-double. He eyed the doughnuts on display, the menu above the cashiers, and he sat down with his coffee. At some point in the dream, I bought the fellow breakfast to the disapproving stares of others in the building. As I paid for his meal, something compelled me to tell them why I was doing it. I can still feel the emotion of my response.
This is Bill. Bill is why.
Homelessness often starts with mental illness or addiction. Our home growing up had one which led to the other. Our mother didn’t become homeless, only because her husband took “for better for worse, in sickness and in health” rather seriously.
I won the genetic lottery, not in looks but mental wellness… for the most part. (The name “Crazy Woman” given to me by a couple of our indigenous instructors notwithstanding). My brother won a good dose of charm and a propensity for addiction. Nothing he chose, nothing he wanted, just the luck of the draw.
Best Friends
His struggles began to see light in his teenage years and for many years he struggled. Lost licenses, lost marriage, lost respect.
Finally, he moved from hospital to a treatment facility and came out with the addiction pushed to the background. He got married again and had three beautiful children who he loved to the moon and back. One with the family dimple, one who looked a lot like him and one who possessed a natural joy. He went above and beyond for a Dad of this era; after a full day of work, his evening often consisted of bathing the kids, getting them into their PJ’s, folding laundry and choosing their clothes for the next day.
He loved every minute of it.
For 12 years, he worked, supported his family, rejoined society and loved those kids. Then one day it slipped a little when he got a taste of a new addiction. Often it isn’t the original addiction that gets someone who has walked that path before…
He slipped completely after our Dad died. Dad had always held him up when the going got tough, just as he had with my mother. I can’t imagine what it must have felt like to lose that safety net entirely. I know it was painful to watch him fall.
One thing remained constant. He loved those kids.
He wasn’t able to see his children during those tough times. He sunk deeper; that loss was the toughest of all. As his addiction took more control, he ended up living in his truck in the parking lot of our childhood church: this good looking happy child, this handsome outdoors-loving teen, this loving father… was homeless.
It seemingly ended on a train track in Southern Alberta one night. What Bill didn’t know was he still lived in the hearts of his kids, especially the oldest who remembered the good times best. She remembered him still when she got married last summer, and I was honoured to join her other auntie walking her down the aisle in his place.
My niece had given her uncle a picture of her Dad to take throughout the day, to the ceremony, awaiting her at the altar, to picture taking, and at the reception, joining us at our table. At one point in the evening he even joined her and uncle in a dance.
She never stopped missing him. Addicted or not, homeless or not…she missed who he had been in their lives. This oldest girl has tried to help the younger two know him the best she can.
As her sister plans a wedding and her brother reestablishes his relationship with his sisters, she misses who he could have been in their lives.
Next year Bill becomes a Grandpa and I know what a special thing being a grandparent is. (The baby will call me Grauntie! )
I’m a Grauntie!
My brother wasn’t at his best during his moments of crisis but I loved him too (even when I didn’t like him) because I remembered the entirety of his journey.
As many communities face an opioid crisis and are repelled by lost souls more visible than ever, it’s hard to remember their humanity. Their previous lives may have included parenthood, home ownership, satisfying work…Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sons and daughters. We remembered this during my husband’s birthday party at a park in Calgary, AB this summer.
Behind this photo is a fellow who entered the park, pushing a shopping cart. One of my girls brought him food from our barbecue, he rescued our ball from the river, and we expressed our heartfelt thanks. (It was rather amazing what he could invent from the contents of that cart.) The most important moment of that day for this guy? It was probably when my husband turned to him and asked, “So what’s your story?” Hubby told him he didn’t have to share, but my husband caring to hear it was likely a humanizing moment. He did share, and his journey wasn’t far from my brother’s. By the end of the day, the grandkids were asking him if he wanted the plastic tablecloths, and we left him some more food for his next meal… not because we pitied him but because we were just helping a guy out who joined our party for a while.
We all thought of Bill.
When next you see someone camped out or existing in some marginal way, I would never ask you to approach, some addictions are truly scary. I only ask that you adjust your mind to their humanity, to this face of homelessness.
I can still visualize myself on the phone with my Dad. I was beside the telephone, cord held in my hand, one knee on the bench beside the phone. You see, once upon a time young’ uns, we needed a bench because a long conversation meant staying in one place for a while. Heck, could you non-wrinkly folk even run one of those phones?
I can’t remember what I was worried about. (which probably means my Dad’s advice made sense.) He said,
“Why worry? It’s doesn’t solve anything.”
Here I am, not far from the age he would have been at the time, and I realized today that I finally understand and am living his advice.
I recently had an excisional biopsy. The 3-year-olds in my life were all suddenly asking about a mole I’ve always had. When the second one commented I thought,
“Maybe I should have a look at this thing.”
It had changed colour and size but being in an area semi-protected by the sun, I wasn’t too concerned but had the doctor take a look. Doctor wanted a biopsy done to make sure.
There was a time when low risk or not, I would have been awake at night in a state of, if not panic, at least…worry.
I’m not worried at all. This is today, I’m another week or two from hearing the results, and until the results come back, the biopsy doesn’t exist aside from the stitches I’m having removed today.
If you’ve reached retirement, you’ve aged a bit. Along with hot flashes, bad knees or hip replacements (or whatever your particular signs of aging are) comes the gift of all those years and the experiences they’ve brought us.
Some are not so lucky. Today is Green Shirt Day.
Green Shirt Day was born out of the loss of son and brother, it was born out of his organ donation and how it inspired a spike in organ donor registrations across Canada following the Humboldt Broncos bus crash. We know Logan Boulet’s parents. They are good people. It doesn’t surprise me that their son did something so selfless. Doing the right thing is what they do. That’s why, on a day when other parents may have stayed in bed, they’ve launched Green Shirt Day and have spent the last year since their loss spreading the word about having the “Kitchen Table Talk” to make your family aware of your wishes. Today has been one year since they laid an ear against their son’s chest and listened to his heart for the very last time. Today someone else feels that heart beating.
Along with that heart, 5 other people benefited from Logan’s donation.
Another mother is honouring Green Shirt Day today. Her daughter Paige was 17 when she passed… Like Logan, she helped 6 people to live better lives when hers was over too soon. None of these parents grieves any less but maybe there’s some small comfort in knowing those hearts are still beating.
We’ve been given a gift, living this long. If something happens to end our run…we could pass that gift along. We’re done with ’em. Sign up for organ donation. Tell your family (they will make the final decision so they need to know).
There we were, having made the decision to travel to Italy in honour of my 60th birthday. Trigger pulled; it was time to drag some dusty suitcases out of the closet and purge any travel-size items that had congealed over the last couple of years.
We assembled the required paperwork (there’s more than our pre-COVID travel!), got our prescriptions filled (travel is a little more burdensome as we age…) and chose a travel wardrobe. (Washable, Anti-Wrinkle, Versatile – me and the clothing – check.)
Keys, codes, and to-do lists were left with my daughter. (Estate info too…an optimistic traveller.)
I downloaded our boarding passes, noticing I could only download as far as Paris. Ok. This is new. Paris? Milan? Other than learning the wrong language? Let’s roll with it.
Our son-in-law showed up at the door the morning of our flight, ready to drive us to the airport. Given that the airport was on the OTHER side of Calgary, we gave ourselves plenty of time. Hugs all around, and we rolled into Departures.
We spotted the WestJet counter. Quite a line, but we had lots of time, so we were good to go. After an ever-so-patient wait, we finally reached the front of the line. Progress!
No.
We were “too early” to check-in for our flight, and they pulled us to the side, where we leaned against the wall. We asked if we could leave and come back. We were told to come back in half an hour. Not entirely bad. We found a beer, and all is good.
Back to the lineup. Still long. We waited, again, somewhat patiently. Good to go?
No.
We were told to wait a bit longer, so we held up the wall this time, finally checking in about 20 minutes later. Now…our luggage was checked in but, like us, labelled for Paris, where we had a connecting flight. I like Paris, but I wasn’t sure if we or our luggage would make it to Milan.
I got the attention of a West Jet agent who told me rather vaguely to see an Air France agent in Paris. Sounds simple?
No.
We’ll get to that little story in the next installment.
Luckily the Calgary airport is functioning a little better than I’ve heard the Toronto Pearson airport is. Hence, we got through security as usual. By “as usual,” I mean the Moustache Guy had to go through the metal detector 3 times. He had dumped change, removed his wallet, taken off his belt, shoes, and glasses…and still beeped. We have no idea why, but this happens every time. He figures it’s his good looks making them want to frisk him. He could be on to something.
I waited while the Moustache Guy reassembled himself, and we located our gate. Thank you, Calgary, for making this relatively easy. We were to become more appreciative of this ease as we moved through airports.
We settled to wait, noticing a little fake grass trolley where fur babies could do their business and commented on how that was a new feature in the airport. Later we would wince a little as a young lad rolled himself around on the imitation lawn, wondering when it had last been used or cleaned. We couldn’t look…so we opened the Kobo e-readers and enjoyed some new writers. Kobo Plus was great for this. It’s a subscription service that gave us the first month free and we were able to download a long list of books from classics to originals. Airports turned out to be our biggest reading spots. Snacks nearby, earbuds playing string music. The wait isn’t all bad.
We had splurged on Premium seating to ensure lots of space to get comfortable for sleeping. The new Dreamliner 787 offers a 2 x 3 x 2 configuration in Premium, so it was just us in our cozy little corner. I’m 5 foot 2, so legroom isn’t an issue. Still, I flail and roll and generally cause chaos around me when trying to get comfortable. Really, the person who would have been the third seat in Economy should have pitched in for the price of my ticket. Totally worth it.
Was Premium seating worth it for us? Features included noise-cancelling headphones, a bottle of water and a cute little amenities kit from Rocky Mountain Soap Co. Additionally, we were entitled to complimentary beer and wine and more deluxe meal choices.
That said, it was a LOT more, so the main draw was the space. I did, however, get into my amenities kit asap. (And maybe the wine…)
The Wine was all uphill from here.
The Dreamliner 787 also has features that make it an attractive option for long trips.
Larger windows, positioned for great views, are “dimmable” instead of having shades.
High vaulted ceiling, wide-body (Good for my 7-foot nephew, less critical for my height, but it did help with that claustrophobic feeling.
A quiet air conditioner and technology reduce vibrations and soften engine noise.
Better speakers make the public address system easy to hear.
Environmentally they are a bit more efficient too. Dreamliners use 25% less fuel per passenger compared with aircraft of a similar size.
And, since health was a significant factor in our decision-making process, these features caught my eye.
More humid cabin air means your throat and eyes suffer less dryness.
The cabin is pressurized to 2,000 ft lower than the standard 6000 ft, making it easier to breathe and apparently helps with jet lag.
HEPA filtering technology keeps cabin air clean. The same HEPA filters are used to keep hospital operating room air clean and safe.
Finally, I will say the staff was VERY attentive in Premium. I can only imagine Business class!
First Prosecco – Saluti!
One last text to my daughter with a picture of our “bubbly,” and we are OFF! Will we make it to Milan or end up overnight in Paris?
Path to Pasture 