I would like to tell you that we can come out of hiding from the virus. I’d like to tell you that we can walk around without a mask; that we can fling open the doors and play with our kids, come out of our homes and sing or shout that we can go to the store and find all the little things that we used to buy, like toilet paper and paper towels. It didn’t matter if we needed them or not. It was just a good thing to have.
But the truth is they have decided that we should sing and shout and enjoy our family time until the end of June. (By the way, who are they?) Yep, another few weeks of working in the garden, washing the car and watching TV.
I sit here and look at the white piece of paper on which I am scribbling my thoughts and all I can think of is the talking heads that were on TV last night. He was trying to point out that the coronavirus (CV) is not as deadly as we thought and that our numbers are skewed. By that I mean they really don’t know how many people have died from the CV. They do not have an accurate count of how many died from CV and how many left our world for other reasons.
I had a feeling this was going to come out. No one has egg on their face because the talking heads don’t care how people die, they just want to politicize everything. I haven’t heard of anyone dying from heart disease or diabetes or any other malady. They don’t seem to break it down anymore.
Anyone who lost a loved one doesn’t care how they died, just that they have left this old planet for another home. You wonder what the unfortunate ones were doing that caused their death. They tell themselves, “Hey, I wore the mask. I washed my hands, I stayed 6 feet away from my kids and wife,” and yet they are gone also.
We have spoken of my paranoia before, but now I think there may be more folks that may not admit it, but they are getting a little paranoid also. I based my distrust of the government after I had read “The Pentagon Papers,” and that was reinforced by reading after action reports of all the men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country. They die every day in a far off, dirty, dusty place not far from the birthplace of humanity. They are dying or being maimed every day and what do we have for their sacrifice?
There is more terrible news that although no one seems to have a reasonable explanation of why, we are still in the Middle East. We will continue to be there until someone in Washington decides we have lost too many. These are not the homeless people. These are not the folks that stand on a corner and hold out their hand. These are the cream of their generation. These are the folks that will be running our country, if they are allowed to leave the place where so many have been killed or maimed for nothing.
On the other hand, some states have decided that they have had enough. The governors of a few states have opened their state to free trade and allowed people to walk around without masks in some states. Are they doing this too early? Are they going to cause another plague of CV to be nourished by the death of older people? Are they allowing couples to walk together and hold hands?
My brother Roger lives in Idaho. He has been after me to just move up there. They have fewer cases of death than most other states. Actually, I just Googled it and they have fewer deaths by CV than any other state but Hawaii. It’s tempting to be near my older brother as the pandemic continues, but Hawaii makes more sense.
Just a note: When I was in Alaska, I asked my personal nurse to join me up there and she swallowed hard and said, “OK.” She came up and we had a good time. (I must point out that it was the summer season and the temps were mild.)
So I asked if she might marry me and move up with me. She lowered her head and looked up at me and batted through her eyelashes. “I love you George and I do want to be with you, but if you are going to run away, why don’t you run away to Hawaii. Besides, I think girls have to wear leather underwear in Alaska in the winter.”
Who knows what might have happened? You might have seen her and I on one of those crabbing boats on the television show “Deadliest Catch.” But she would have to be on a boat with a manicurist. She doesn’t like to get her nails messed up. No, it was a great decision she forced me to make. I would have never had the chance to write to you or meet the wonderful people that make up our little town of Gonzales.
I am positive I made the right move. She gave me my two sons and adopted my daughter. God was present when I decided to give up on the idea and come back to the Salinas Valley. You might like to take a trip to Alaska one day. It is one of the prettiest places on earth, but I think you would come home after the first snow storm.
God Bless.
