Life’s (Still) a Trip – 2020 Edition

Not sure if this was the hardest year, weirdest year, meanest year so far in our lives, but one thing is for sure: it was the most unexpected. Nothing, not one hour of any day, was to be planned. “Let it go” and “let it roll off your back” were the mantra of every day.

The secret to have survived it, I think, was to really treat every day with the curiosity of learning something new, for new it was. We took the good (the fact that we had each other, jobs, health and technology, mostly) and learned to make plans for 24 hours at most. As everyone else, we had no frame of reference, no guidebook on how to live this new life. We made it up as we went and settled into our routine. We never dwelt too long on things that were missing. We only welcomed each day with the curiosity of “what should we do now?” rather than “I wonder what’s next?”  

We miss a lot of things, but most of all, we miss the freedom of travel. We didn’t dare venture farther than taking a couple-of-hour road trips, but even those short trips were rewarding and rich. Despite it all, or maybe because of it all, we made memories we otherwise would not have made. When would we have ever planned to visit Washington, NC? Or Rose Hill?! Or Wilson, NC? I still strongly believe that everything is for a reason …

This is a look back at our 2020 (click the picture below to view it).

Happy 2021, everyone! I hope the new year will hold you strong, safe, and healthy, more than ready to face whatever it shall throw your way … We wish you all this, but more so those who have lost so much in 2020. Our hearts and hopes are with you, especially.

The Gratitude List for 2020

“If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” ― Leo Tolstoy, Essays, Letters and Miscellanies

Everyone I know will tell you that they are so sick of 2020. So ready to turn it off, mash that button that turned it on and make it all disappear. But was this year really that different than all the others before it?! In some ways, sure, but in more fundamental ways, wasn’t life this way always?!

This year, like any other year, the world went through much of the same turmoil it has gone through since it’s inception: people got sick with and suffered with at least one new or unknown disease. Just like any other year, some homes have an empty seat at the table because someone died sick, shot, strangled, in war, or in an accident. This year, just like any other year, women were raped and children were abused. Someone of color, someone who was gay or of a different religion than the mainstream one was hurt, abused, marginalized, or even killed. Just like any other year, the voice of injustice spoke once again against the weak and the helpless.

Just like any other year, leaders of the world rose, and leaders of the world collapsed. Supporters cried, and others cheered.

Just like any other year, the world has known happiness and joys, too, in the birth of children, puppies, kittens, and cubs. Kids started schools and the older ones finished them and plunged into life. People married and got divorced. They retired and bought homes. Older people downsized and younger people bought or built their first homes, full of dreams. Someone somewhere was starving, just like any other year, and someone, too, managed to survive hunger, cold, injustice, and more … Wars started and they also ended, leaving people and landscapes scarred, never the same, but perhaps freer.

Through overheating, more hurricanes than every before, war, ignorance and heartbreak, the planet is still here. Our blue bead is still floating into the big abyss. Every sunrise and sunset are just as awesome as always …

But just because something gets more press it doesn’t make it more important. Or worse. Or better.

What was different this year, however, was that, as rarely happens in the life of even many generations, we were given enough time to think about these things. For the first time in a really long time, we know we cannot continue to move along as if nothing happened here. I hope we do something about this new realization.

We have been given this precious gift this year, to internalize every single thing that happens to each of us, ourselves, our families, our neighbors, or even strangers, and to distinguish these things from one another (good from bad, just from unjust, fair from unfair), to think before we speak and move on with what we believe to be our truth. We were given the time to understand, perhaps, better than any time before, that what has happened for many years, hundreds of years at time, can no longer continue to happen. We were given the strength to know that it starts with every one of us to change the world and make more of those happy times happen rather than the evil ones happen … I hope. We were, for the first time in many generations, perhaps, given a clear-as-crystal vision to understand that it starts and ends with us. We alone are the ones to carry the blame as well as the victory flag. Every. One. Of. Us.

In this eye-opening year, when I mourned deaths, and cried alongside with people who still suffer every day, I found myself feeling an enormous amount of gratitude for what I have been so undeservedly blessed to have in my life. I wanted to stop for a minute and acknowledge all that I do have and thank all of the people who made my life possible and so rich. This year, more than any other before, I am humbled by the amount of bounty that I have been given.

This is my gratitude list for 2020.

• My husband. His mere presence.
• Our jobs
• Our house
• Our health
• Every moment together with the ones I love on the right side of the dirt is a gift
• Health insurance
• Our physical independence that allows us to stay mobile. 
• My mom’s relative stabilization of her lung cancer. Her strength and resilience.
• My dad’s ability to walk and drive
• My aunt’s strength, physical and mental, and her ability and willingness to help my parents
• My mother in law’s amazing strength and fierce independence to take care of herself every day as a double amputee approaching 80. She is unstoppable! 
• Our extended family’s health
• Our family’s physical safety
• My sister and everything she stands for that I am not: kind, patient, giving to a fault, loyal, the best mother, and so much more ...
• Our freedom
• Our memories
• The peace that we have been blessed with right before we fall asleep in our woodsy neighborhood
• Our ability to read and get virtually any book we want so we can stay aware
• Our food, every day. Every meal.
• Soap
• Toilet paper
• Masks to protect us from others’ germs and the ability to wear them without much effort
• Our car
• Road trips
• The beautiful state we live in that gets us out of house and fills our eyes and hearts with the beauty of its land
• Vegan ice cream
• Eastern European food stores that bring home to me when travelling there is not possible
• Science advancements
• Medicine
• Vaccines 
• Good doctors from my past that were one step ahead of diseases completely destroying me
• My cardiac surgeon, Dr. Mitchell.
• Another year surgery-free
• Nurses, orderlies, medical facility cleaning staff
• Skype, Zoom, Facetime
• My favorite yoga teacher who can now teach me remotely from Greensboro, NC
• Friends who still email out of the blue to check in. You know who you are. 
• Foot rubs at the end of the day
• Electricity
• The internet
• Safe water and air
• Fiery sunsets
• Long and flat forest hikes
• Orchids
• The smell of fresh dough
• Making a brand new recipe successfully
• Parchment paper
• Rainbows. They give you such hope!
• Getting 100% reimbursed for a trip we were not allowed to take anymore with no consequences or penalties
• Air-dropping on i-devices
• The order of the universe. We had several retrograde planets, a huge planet conjunction, asteroids coming at us, but we’re still here, floating around our star. 
• Streaming 
• 72F in November
• That we’re not fearing bombs being dropped over our heads every minute
• That we can hold a decent job and have most of what we need: clothes, food, entertainment, extra cash.
• Tireless lab techs that return lab results before the end of the day
• My Romanian teacher who still believes in my writing and publishes it in our local literary magazine
• All the lessons all my elders have taught me
• The memories my kitties left me with. They carried me through this year of being pet-less.
• The sassy, smart, cheeky jokes of my nephews. They remind me that there is beauty and hope under the ugly rugs of the day, as long as there is laughter. 
• Home-use machines for testing blood pressure, oxygen levels, or levels of INR (blood coagulation metrics)
• Touchless credit card technology
• Hand sanitizer
• Front-line workers in any crisis
• My prayer list got longer this year - I am grateful to have so many people to care about and wish well.
• The FH Foundation and its relentless leaders and contribution to making our lives better
• Outdoor cats that heal my longing for one, even for a brief minute - their beauty and grace.
• All the funny people in my life - my dad, husband, my nephews, especially. 
• I learned that I CAN actually function without plans or when the whole world blows up my plans  and the sun still rises in the East the next day. 
• My husband’s vegan shortbread cookies
• Woodpeckers
• Unpleasant business had a way of turning itself off this year, with little to no effort on my part. Being true to myself and having some patience paid off. 
• Those who speak for justice and equality. Their courage makes life better for all of us. 
• Those who share their stories so we can learn from real life.
• Right turns. Life is complicated enough without having to turn left and risk getting hit.
• Those people who wear a mask with a smile. You can see that in their eyes. They show kindness to others rather than discontent for their inconvenience. 

I hope and wish for all of these blessings and for many, many more for all of you into the new year, and always … 

The Tree

I told myself a long time ago that I would always decorate a tree for Christmas. As long as I am able and on my two feet, I will always pull out the boxes from the attic and hang the ornaments on that tree. So far, I have kept my promise. I have a whole routine, just like we did when we were little and my sister and I decorated our family's tree. Then, we had Christmas cartoons playing on the VCR. Nowadays, I switch to Pandora Christmas stations on my iPad and listen to "happy" Christmas music (none of that sad, somber classical stuff which is good, but not for tree trimming!). 

I do believe that decorating marks the actual end of the year for me - trimming the house, cleaning it, emptying out the closets of clothes I haven't worn, and ... the Christmas tree, the celebration that we made it through another trip around The Sun. It's a milestone, visible, tangible. 

Over the years, my tree has gotten a lot of personality, I think. First off, since around 2004 or so, I decided that ornaments of my tree should only be either purple or white. The lights - only white. No other color is allowed and there are very few exceptions but they must be extremely well argumented. I used to be an "all-color ornaments" type of person. But around 2004 or so, a friend from work gave me a purple ornament because she knew that was my favorite color. That started it all. I thought, "wouldn't it be nice to only have purple ornaments in my tree?!" 

Experience has taught me that purple ornaments are rare, and the tree might look too dark in "only" purple, so white and silver came to the rescue. Nowadays, I have lots of ornaments that we picked out on our many travels (remember those?!), as well as many that my friends have gifted me. They are more or less eclectic, but there are themes, too, like Nativity, or hearts, for example. 

When I trim my tree every year, it not only gives me a chance to reflect over another finished year, but by unboxing all the ornaments, it gives me a chance to remember all those who gave them to me. Our common experiences and bonds. Our friendships, or even estrangement. I remember all the places that I went to to get them and bring them home. This year, more than ever, I felt like we needed more connection (for obvious reasons), and the ornaments helped me remember that we're not alone in the world. That people that love us are out there, behind masks, waiting patiently, and one day, if we hope right ... we might find them again and make new stories. 

Here are some of the favorite highlights from our tree. 

The purple tea kettle that started it all - cca 2004

My husband is German. My mother-in-law taught us a German tradition that says you have to hide a pickle in the Christmas tree for good luck. She gave this to us for our first Christmas as a married couple (2010). This is one of the "non-purple-or-white" exceptions.

Ours friends went to Jerusalem a few years back and brought us this olive wood-carved Nativity Scene. It is one of my favorite ornaments, still. 

Just like the one above, these are an exception to the color - they are all made of wood. My husband made both of these. Although the "spinner" is truly gorgeous and so classy, I really like the whimsical snowman because the hat makes him so sassy.

AtTask 2013 - this is the company I have worked for now for close to 10 years, which has been renamed twice since this ornament was gifted to us at a Christmas party and since I started there. It's probably a collectible right about now. 

There are a lot of hearts in my tree. Those who know me understand why. My husband gave me this enormous purple one the year I had my open-heart surgery (2016). It's mouth-blown glass and so heavy. I love so much its symbolism. 

My husband and I give each other an ornament every year, much like we give each other a card. I have said the words written on this heart to him for years. And one year (I believe 2017), I walked into a store in our new city in NC and there it was. I got it because it pretty much tells our story, the way I see it. 

One of my long, long, long-time friends gave me this camera ornament. It's mostly black (another exception), but it has a fair amount of silver, so it's allowed. It's also allowed because we're both shutter bugs. 

Two of my absolute favorites: home-made ornaments by my sister, with my nephews, back when they loved each other and would sit still (mostly) for a cute picture. They are frozen in time and will always and forever be this cute and happy and perfect to me. (2012 and 2011)

One of my dear friends gave me these two ornaments  during a completely different time in my life. So different that it seems now like it was in another life. They are both hand-painted - the first one is glass and the second one is a real egg painted with the Nativity Scene. I love how fragile and unique they are. Another thing I love about my tree is how it holds the history of almost my entire life and reminds me of my journey.  

This is part of our "travel" collection: Mexico, Hawaii, Outer Banks, NC, Biltmore Estate (Asheville, NC), San Francisco, CA, Key West, FL

We bought this on our last cruise (2019) in The Bahamas. While we were on that cruise, our sweet cat, Gypsy died at home. We were not ourselves the entire trip. I could not have thought of anything more fitting to get for my tree than an angel that will forever remind me of him. Out of all our travel ornaments, this one is the most meaningful.

This is a wire ball filled with pine potpourri. My aunt gave it to me in 2008! and it still smells like pine. I have never changed its content. We bought it while she was visiting the US for her first (and only) time. 

One of my dearest friends gave me these two hearts. They are sweet reminders of her and what a kind person and steadfast friend she is. 

These are my babies. I might have other kitties at some point in my life, but they will always, no matter how small my tree will get, be in my tree. Always part of my life in some way ... Miss them all dearly, especially as I decorate, because there are no tails popping out of empty ornament boxes anymore.  

I lived in NC before but never knew you are supposed to have a cardinal in your Christmas tree for good luck. I just found that out last year. It is my favorite wild bird, so as soon as I learned this I indulged in yet another exception to the color. 

I hope that whatever your physical or metaphorical tree holds this year it reminds you of happy times and foretells of many possibilities to come. 

I wish everyone much health, first, and much hope. 

Happy Holidays, everyone! 

“COVID-19: How it worked for us” - a guest blog

Becky is my team mate. She lives in Utah. She and her daughter and husband were diagnosed with COVID19 around Labor Day (September 7, 2020). This is her story, in her own words, and what she wants the world to know about having had COVID19. 

September 8, 2020: Becky’s announcement in a chat message to our team that her family has been diagnosed with COVID19 (a day after diagnosis)

All three <members of our family> that live here have coronavirus. (My son escaped to college in time.) We're still trying to figure out what exactly that means, like, logistically. But it's a fair bet that I'll be in and out in a pretty random/sporadic schedule. We're okay, mostly. We don't have any health risk factors, and we DO have health insurance,  but this is going to be a weird week for sure.

September 17: Becky’s note to our team after having been sick for 10 days

<rant> I'm pretty frustrated about this. I made good choices, wore my mask every time I left the house, didn't go anywhere I didn't need to go. It didn't matter, because other people didn't wear masks, and then my daughter brought it home. Now I'm sitting here unable to carry things up and down the stairs or EAT CHOCOLATE because somebody else thought it was no big deal. I would be exponentially more pissed if I or anyone I loved would have actually had a bad case. I 100% support a mask mandate and other nanny state behavior and I wish they would shut up and DO it already. I apologize, and I will not interject politics again.</rant>. 

October 8: She sent me this account privately in a Google doc (a month and a day after diagnosis) 

On this day, I had asked her if I might be too paranoid to still obey all the guidelines and restrictions and to still be very guarded and isolated. She said plainly she will send me her full story (below) and then she added: “In short: you are NOT paranoid!”

People are listed in the order that we caught it. Each person’s story is separate, but in real life we all caught it within a few days of each other, so we overlapped a lot.

One of the weirdest things was that we all had completely different sets of symptoms, although we were all definitely sick. The only thing that happened to all of us was losing smell and taste.

Victoria

Age 17, no known risk factors

Main symptoms: Mostly shortness of breath

Tori was the first to get it. We think she got it from school, because when she went back to school after isolation, someone she sits near in one of her classes had only returned from COVID isolation a few days before. Logically, they would have also had it a few days before her. We wondered if she’d caught it from friends, but all the friends she’d been in contact with had to get tested (because they’d been exposed to her). Only one had it, and he had symptoms a few days after her, so we think he caught it from her instead of the other way around. It’s also possible she got it from work (grocery store), but it doesn’t sound like any of her coworkers had it, and there’s no way to know about customers.

The first day (September 4), she had a fever and felt yucky. Her fever was only 100.something, and it never really got any higher than that. She had some pretty bad muscle pain that day too. She called in to work and they told her she had to get tested before she could work again. So I took her down and got her tested. Results back 24 hours later, positive. She only felt rotten for a couple of days, but she was short of breath for like a week. At one point (I want to say day 4?) she wasn’t feeling so bad, but she was getting short of breath. Her oxygen levels were okay (we had a finger tester) but a doctor friend said he’d probably take her in. I took her to the ER because her regular doctor and insta-care didn’t want us to come in and spread germs. The ER x-rayed her for pneumonia (she didn’t have it) and gave her a prescription for an inhaler. She used it every few hours for a couple of days, then less and less and now I think it’s been more than a week. She did lose taste and smell, but seemed to have it mostly back in a couple of weeks. She says it’s hard to know exactly if it’s all back, because she didn’t pay enough attention before she lost it, and it’s hard to compare and judge. She was 90% better in 2 weeks, and I would say is totally better now (October 8).

NOTE: Of the 6 friends that had to be isolated and tested because they’d been exposed to her, only 2 had gone into self-isolation when she told them they’d been exposed. 4 had to be told to isolate by the health department even though they knew they’d been exposed, and 2 were actively mad at Tori for giving their names to the health department because they’d have to miss work and not get money while they were tested. This is probably why, at least in Utah, cases are going up among young people: because at least some of them are idiots.

NOTE: HOORAY FOR HEALTH INSURANCE AT THE ER

Joshua

Age 45, no known risk factors

Main symptoms: Coughing, headaches

Josh caught it a couple of days after Tori. We think he caught it from her. As soon as she was sick we isolated her, brought food to her room, wiped everything down with Lysol, everything, but it was already too late. He had a cough for a couple of days, but it was so smoky here (in Utah) that we’d just assumed that he was coughing from that. Then when Tori tested positive we thought “uh-oh” and he got tested. He was of course positive, although before we heard back about his test the health department called and said they were going to put us down in the computer as positive anyway since we lived with Tori.

The cough was about the same as a cough from a regular cold. It lasted for about a week. Nyquil helped some. The headache was pretty bad and lasted for, I want to say, 5 days (off and on, but mostly on). The health department said to take Tylenol, but you can’t take much of that. Ibuprofen they said might not hurt, but other articles said it might, so we tried to avoid that. We didn’t have any aspirin. The headache was mostly in the forehead, like a really horrible sinus headache, but his nose was clear. Josh was never short of breath.

Josh was tested on September 7, and went backpacking on September 26, so he was feeling completely better by then. He’d been feeling better for a while, but I think if you go hiking in the mountains and overnight backpacking and you’re just fine, you’re pretty much completely healthy.

Becky

Age 45, no known risk factors*

Main symptoms: Muscle pain, fatigue (sleepy), fatigue (weak), shortness of breath, lack of smell

*My family has a history of autoimmune disorders, but I don’t have one that I know of. Also I should probably mention that my cholesterol tends to be a bit high naturally (despite diet and exercise) but not enough for medication (190s).

This one has more details because it’s the one that I saw from the inside, so to speak.

My first symptom was a scratchy throat. I started feeling it on the day Josh was tested, so I went and got tested even though it was just a little scratchy throat. At that point, we thought Tori had it, and Josh maybe had it, and I didn’t have it, so we were all living in separate parts of the house and not interacting at all. The health department said to assume I had it, and that was nice because then at least we could talk to each other and watch movies together and stuff. Then I got a positive test result even though I wasn’t feeling very bad yet. Then I started to feel rotten. 

I did get the same sinus headache, but only for a couple of days. I was a little bit congested, but not very, even though I apparently snored a lot. I had some bathroom trouble one day. But the main symptoms for me were:

Muscle pain. So much pain. More than I’ve ever had without an actual injury. It was mostly concentrated in my hips and legs, but even my teeth hurt. And it lasted for like five days. Tylenol helped some, but again you can’t take it very often. It just made the pain a little less painful for a couple of hours. Tori said she was in a lot of pain too, that first day, and that her friend also commented on how much pain he was in. It surprised me because for how much pain it was, you’d think it would be in the news more.

Fatigue (sleepy): It’s hard to know where the fatigue was coming from because there was a lot going on. I was sick, which makes you tired, but also I wasn’t sleeping well. The pain kept me awake, and also I was extremely stressed out because we all had COVID. That was the first week. The second week I slept like 12 hours a day. The third week I had trouble sleeping again, but I think that was just stress and bad luck. This week my sleep schedule’s out of whack so I don’t know if I’m still having fatigue or not.

Shortness of breath: This one’s weird, because it didn’t show up until I was mostly feeling better. I was sick for two weeks, then improving for one week, and then the shortness of breath kicked in and I’m way worse than I was a couple of weeks ago. I went to the library yesterday and by the time I got back to the car I was breathing like I’d been running. I breathe hard after gathering up laundry. I breathe hard when playing Guitar Hero. It’s ridiculous.

Fatigue (weak): I suspect this is a side effect from the shortness of breath. I was okay right after I started feeling better but now I’m so weak. I can’t get through a grocery trip without crying when I get back to the car. I can’t go for a walk because it’s hard to get back up the hill to home. If I overdo things, it feels like really low blood sugar or something where you can feel your muscles desperately searching for energy and there just isn’t any. It’s super frustrating for a few reasons. It’s frustrating to have to depend on people to do stuff I feel like I should be able to do myself (shopping, chores). It’s frustrating to be stuck at home because it’s so boring here. When video games are too tiring, all that’s left is movies and needlework. I’m running out of movies, and needlework has its own way of driving you slowly crazy. That’s probably not useful info to you but ARRRRGH I’M SO FRUSTRATED.

Losing smell and taste: You can function just fine without smell and taste, but it’s very weird and surprisingly depressing. Whether we want to admit it or not, comfort food cheers people up, and when you’re already stuck at home feeling rotten, losing taste feels like kicking you when you’re down. Also there was this weird not-quite-smell-not-quite-feeling that was there for the first week or so that was weird and unpleasant. And I was like, well, none of us can smell so hopefully we don’t get a gas leak or anything this week! That lasted longer than any other symptom for any of us, and it came back in bits and pieces, so I could smell flowers, but not cooking meat, and cloves smelled weird because I think I was only detecting some of the chemicals or something. Weird and unpleasant.

I don’t know why I’m having trouble so long after the rest of the family is better. Bad luck I suppose. I have a checkup on the 25th (of September) so if it’s still going on then I’ll find out more. 

Michael

Age 19

Michael left for college on August 19, and didn’t ever show symptoms, so that was a huge relief that he just missed it completely.

October 9: Becky’s note to me (a month and 2 days after diagnosis):

Update on coronavirus in case it's useful to know: I did have to go to the insta-care clinic this morning because my breathing took a turn for the worse. They x-rayed me (I'm fine) and gave me an inhaler and also some pretty heavy doses of prednisone (steroid) for the next five days. I do feel a little better this afternoon, so here's hoping it helps. 

October 23: another update from Becky (a month and 2 weeks after diagnosis)

I went into the ER Friday because I was having trouble breathing and my chest hurt. I probably didn’t need to go to the ER, but I was freaking out. They took another x-ray and an EKG and tested me for blood clots (my mom died from blood clots). That was all fine. The doctor told me I have “Reactive Airway Disease” which is apparently what they call asthma when you haven’t been specifically tested for asthma. They put me on some pills (generic Singulair) and some powder that I have to breathe in (Advair) which are both asthma medications. The good news is that they seem to be working! The doctor said that I’d probably be on them for several months.  I still get winded and tired easily, but I don’t have to lie down nearly as much, and when I’m not active I feel totally fine, which is new and exciting for me.

I asked her if she had ever been diagnosed with asthma before or any other lung disease. She answered: No, I don't think so. I can't remember having anything like this before. I get hay fever sometimes, but I don't think that involves your lungs. I do have a cousin with asthma, but no one in my immediate family has it. I'm just glad the doctor figured out what was going on and how to treat it. I'm not thrilled about possibly having asthma, but it's way better than having breathing problems that I don't know what's happening or what to do, if that makes sense.

December 2, 2020: I asked Becky for an update on this day. This is her note ( 5 days shy of 3 months after diagnosis)

Becky’s been wonderful: she is one of the hardest-working people I know. Incredibly smart, too, and even more, incredibly humble. On the virtual calls we have, though, she always looks very tired. So, I checked in with her and asked her today how she feels and whether the doctors have any idea when her life will be back to normal. This was her answer: 

My doctor said 3-6 months. 3 months is next week so I'm pretty sure I'm not going to make that goal.  If I'm not noticeably better in February I'm supposed to go back and she'll start sending me to specialists. It wouldn't do me any good to go to specialists yet because I might still get better by myself. Personally, I don't know if I will. I haven't made any improvement in a while, so right now it's less "rest so I can get better" and more "rest because this is what life is like now." 

Honestly it's kind of rough, emotionally. I am trying very very hard to be patient and optimistic, but some days that's kind of hard to do. I don't mean to complain. I really don't. I know that other people have it much worse. No one I know has died from COVID, and my sister has MS and has been dealing with this sort of thing for years. But I don't love it, and I wish people would understand that this is just not worth the risk. I do have LOTS of support, so that's good. I have no idea how I would cope if I was alone.  

... it's been nearly 3 months, I'm still on Advair and Singulair, and I'm still only able to walk around the block, and not even every day. If I do more than that it's a bad time.  

I thank Becky tremendously for letting me share this with you all and I respect her courage for fighting this, as well as her selflessness for sharing herself so kindly, honestly, and thoughtfully with the world. She is my hero! 

Much health to you, Becky, and thank you, again, for the gift you have given us of your story. 

You’ll live! I promise you.

The year was 1998. That’s when I moved to the United States. Due to some visa restrictions that are irrelevant here, I was not allowed to leave the country until my Green Card was issued. I had no idea how long that’d be. I applied for it the same year, but the INS doesn’t tell you anything about anything. You apply for something, and they will notify you. One day. It can be tomorrow (it never is, really), or in 10 years. You’re at their mercy.

 

I could leave the country, really, but that might have meant I might never be allowed to come back. Newly married and starting my job and my life in the US, I didn’t want to risk not ever coming back. So, I stayed. And for two years (this is how long it was till the INS finally granted my Green Card), I was not allowed to leave the country.

 

I was 23 at the time and 1998 was a tough year for me. For the first time in my life, I was away from the only people I had ever called “family” for all the important occasions: my birthdays, theirs, deaths, and all the holidays. We had no Skype, no Zoom, no Facetime. I had a discount phone plan with MCI (landline; remember them? With the sun on the “i”?!) that cut my cost-per-minute by 10-20% or some such number. I was making minimum wage and could not afford to talk for more than 10-15 minutes once a month or so.  The normal going rate was something like $2.50 for Romania.

 

Those two years were my practice time, where I learned how to survive and have a more-or-less normal life knowing I would maybe never be with my family for many, if not all, of the most important occasions. I admit, as a 23-year-old, that was something to get used to. By 2000 I got into the groove of it. It was what we did. And we lived. The distance and the absence did not kill us.

 

Nowadays, the desperation of people not being with their families for Thanksgiving this year puzzles me. Yes, I know it hurts. I know it’s not what we “normally” do. Like I said: I have been there. But why risk our health and that of those we love for a get-together?! That part, I don’t understand. Sure, there are still millions out there who don’t believe this pandemic is real, but even those millions that believe in it (although it’s science and not Santa Claus, really) are willing to risk it all for 24 hours of eating turkey with an audience. I just don’t get it.

Today, we have so many ways of communicating and practically feel like we’re right there, in each other’s homes, that I would think it would be a no-brainer being safe and not sorry later. Or better safe than sick. I know the remote options for communication work because today I meet with my family weekly for free for about a couple of hours every Sunday. We catch up on the week and gossip about the rest of the family. It’s great.

We still don’t celebrate, for the most part, holidays together. That is “our normal” and that has become our routine. We managed to find and make other traditions over the years around the holidays and we cherish them just as much as the old ones before we decided to live in different countries. We don’t mourn what we don’t have anymore (we have not done that in 20 years now), and we’re grateful for the times when we can travel and see each other. Those times, regardless of when in the year they occur, are holidays within themselves. We’re ever so thankful for technology and each other regardless of how many courses we all eat together from the same kitchen (Thanksgiving does not apply for my own family, but you get the idea). We have survived this distance. We have built other bridges to communicate and find other times to communicate in. And if we could, like so many millions of other immigrant families, I am sure we all can.

 

I wish strength and optimism to those who decide to stay home and make memories in a new (and hopefully not-to-be-repeated-again) way. Better days will come. They must. I wish everyone else who decides to travel and get together this season much care, precaution, and much luck.

 

Regardless of your choice, Happy Thanksgiving to all! 

Historical Amnesia. How America Lost Its Way

What I wish that my family's 42 (and my 15) years of living in an authoritarian regime can teach America today

“ Ignorance can make us foot soldiers for unworthy causes. “ - Tara Westover, “Educated”

I was in college in Romania, studying to get my English major, when this American professor from Texas came to speak with us. One of the students asked him what is the biggest difference between Romania and America, and he said: “Well, you guys are many years behind America in many ways but you are not focusing your efforts into being more advanced than you are. Instead, you think your strength is in speaking about how glorious your past was. You always speak about your history and your past. But in America, let me tell you, the average American who walks down the street and enjoys their juicy burger at McDonald's and shoots their rockets into space doesn’t give a crap about history or how glorious or not that was.” I am sure I was not the only one in the audience who cringed a little and found his statement so cheapening coming from a representative of a nation most of us revered. Now, 20 some years later, I cringe still.

Nowadays, I cringe because I see the sad, the painful, the sometimes irreversible effects of so many years, decades of average Americans not giving a crap about their country’s and the world’s history. Americans find more interest in a cheap reality show displaying daily from the White House, from an accidental bug landing on a VP’s head on national television than spending the same amount of time and energy learning about history and worrying about where their present history is taking them. But that is another topic for another blog.

If you’re born in a small country like Romania, a country that has been the victim of many historical accidents and horrors, you are not only following history. It’s ingrained in your DNA. You breathe it, you eat it for breakfast and for every meal. It’s your duty since birth to preserve it, carry it on and ensure you won’t repeat it. It’s a requirement and an unwritten order to sheer survival.

For the first 15 years of my life, I was brought up in the worst years of Communist Romania, the dying years. For those who think Communism and Socialism are the same thing, they are not. I know, you don’t follow history, but I’ll say just this for your education: the difference between Communism and Socialism is that between China and France. It’s that between Cuba and Canada or Sweden. Not. The. Same. Thing. It was not only a Communist regime, but one of the worst authoritarian regimes in the history of the world. Communism is rarely if ever non-authoritarian. I learned to grow up guarded, with no trust in anyone who was not myself, not even in my parents and grandparents. I grew up in fear, and in lacking. We lacked food, running water (although the plumbing was there), soap , toilet paper, decency, dignity, and above all freedom. Not only freedom to read what we wanted and speak what we wanted, but freedom to think.

During that time I was coming of age and I started asking questions. I never understood how one person with just a handful of people just as evil as himself could control the millions of Romanians in the country. How a country that calls themselves “democratic” (which means “demos+kratos” = the power of the people) can become so swiftly “autocratic” (the power of one). How one person can impose such a rule of fear when the rule was crushing the very humanity and human dignity that I felt we should all have and respect in one another. I never understood, until the days of the Revolution of December 1989, why people cannot just kick this person and his handful of acolytes out and start fresh with a new era, when pretty much everyone in the street knew his regime was wrong and crushing. I had the same questions then about why Hitler, who was allegedly elected in free elections, could not be stopped by his own people before he ruined half of the world and a whole nation in particular. I could not understand how authoritarianism can be instated when most people should see it coming like a freight train.

Today’s America, the past several years, mostly, has shown me just how this can happen. Little by little, every day, every piece of news that comes across the wires shows me (and should show all of us, as a nation) how this happens. To me, it’s written on the wall in plain, simple English. Second-grade level plain English.  

This is what this blog is about. I will tell you things that have become the new normal for this country and are things that I lived only during my Communist years in Romania. I command you, American folks, to really shut the world off for a minute, shut off Facebook, and Twitter, and Instagram and really, really think about these things. Decide whether you want your country to head into the direction that so many other authoritarian regimes lead many other countries in this world. Imagine you are multiplied into millions of people that want the same thing. Would you want yourself to be a victim of such a ruling? Just think. Then act. 

Like 1945 when a weakened Romania after the world war needed to fill a void with some ideal and just like the 1930’s when Germany needed a new ideal to believe in (I know, this is not as juicy as a McDonald's burger, it’s history, but bear with me), we are at crossroads in America today. We are in turmoil and we need to fill a void. But with what we’re filling it, what direction we choose from here on out will not only change what we have today, but will pen the destiny of this country, and of the world, not for years, but for generations to come. Unfortunately, in moments like these, the guy with the loudest rhetoric is not the good guy.  Maybe it’s not too late for America to choose the right way. But what I see seems far too gone. “Maybe” sounds optimistic.

I do need to add this one disclaimer: this is not, by any means, democratic (or "liberal") propaganda. I believe that some democrats have their blame in this, too. What follows is my truth, the one I have lived myself, proven by history. I am no one’s tool or messenger. I am sharing what I have seen and experienced myself and what my parents and grandparents experienced before me. And I will add that I am incredibly grateful that despite it all today, I am not afraid for my life when I write and post these thoughts on an open blog. At least not yet. 

So, here is my list of things that you and I live with today that I only lived once before, during my life in Authoritarian Communist Romania, arguably the darkest time of my life:

• Votes are a total waste and a cheap fake show of fake democracy. They can be sold, thrown into the garbage and completely disregarded. Even when intelligence shows they were stolen, those instated in power are allowed to proceed with the fake results because the one person says so. What is the point? – you might ask. The voting process is always allowed to proceed even in an authoritarian regime to keep the appearance of a democracy. But the inner workings of it all are gutted of fairness.
• There is no person higher than the one in charge in the president’s mansion, whatever you call that. No person nor law above their head.
• All foreign powers are evil and want us harm. Those who destabilize the country are foreign powers and not his own forces and personnel. Divisive propaganda to ensure absolute power is installed: “Trust us, not them” becomes the battle cry.
• Every country in the world is our enemy except those that have an authoritarian regime in power.
• The country leader puts his own family members and close friends in power positions even when everyone in the country understands that they are all grossly under- or non-qualified. Such concepts like “conflict of interest” are derided and perceived as destabilizing.
• The country leader lavishes in gold while the country lives paycheck to paycheck. Food stamps, homelessness are foreign concepts to the man in charge and he wishes to destroy any mere mention of them as a personal shame to his own regime, instead of acknowledging them as a fact and asking how he can help. He displays complete and utter lack of empathy which is poisonous for a “service” job as that of a democratic president.
• He favorizes the wealthy and the few to the detriment of the many and the poor.
• The regime dehumanizes people, whether they are innocent or proven guilty. People are  put in camps, or cages – units of sheer terror. In these camps, they break families up and sort people by sex (men separated from women) instead of trying them and following human-right principles of the law as agreed upon by all countries of the democratic world.
• The country leader demands people and the military to participate in lavish and expensive parades to celebrate himself, complete with tanks and the military to display his power, not the country’s achievements (very different concepts!).
• Intellectuals (yeah, those people we should listen to because they read history) flee the country as a last resort, seeing the helplessness of turning any of it around.
• Mediocrity and corruption is advanced: people who can be bought and not people who can apply the existing law of the land are promoted.
• The existing law of the land must change to fit his needs, and instead of letting the people (those in Congress elected by the people) change it, he changes it with the power of his one signature.
• Political discourse is dead. The only thing that exists, the only reality is the power of him and a very small group of close allies in key positions. The deviousness that only blind greed for power can muster ensures that every institution, little by little, responds to his beck-and-call.
• You’re afraid to speak your mind if that means speaking anti-him/ them. You can make all the fun you want and feel “free” to denigrate his opposers, to denigrate anyone who is “out of the norm” for what they believe the norm is, like people who worship differently, or people with disabilities, or people who are different for one reason or another, or make choices not popular to the regime’s choices. You still feel like you have freedom of speech, when in fact, you don’t. You have freedom of abusing those who dare stand against them or be different. Freedom of abuse is not freedom of speech.
• Police controls your thoughts and not your actions.
• He politicizes (hides behind his party) the Department of Homeland Security, the Supreme Court along with issues that chip away at freedom and the country’s autonomy, like the Russian interference in elections, Covid etc. Those are blows against the country and not a political statement of any party. They should, in a healthy democracy, be dealt with accordingly and not along party lines.
• He militarizes local defense: replaces local police with military forces.
• He promotes war, dissension over healthy discussion and diplomacy, even or especially in his own country. “Divide and conquer” is the motto of his every action. The more we feel fearful and scared and not act, the easier and faster his reach advances.
• He forbids the press from attending meetings, press conferences, and makes threats that he will close TV stations and newspapers who don’t agree with his ideas. Trust me, in the beginning these are empty threats. I lived to know they will be eventually carried out.
• Freedom of press is the first rule of a true democracy. It’s in the Constitution. He does everything to undermine or discredit that. And I know this is an effort of thinking for some: but by press I do not mean Facebook, Twitter, or even Apple News. I mean find the writing of those reporters who risk their lives to tell the truth.
• Doors are closed to the press, to the people, during big decision-making meetings.
• He forbids people from testifying when subpoenaed in matters of the country, or matters that regard his truthfulness and record.
• He pardons convicted criminals for the simple reason that they are his friends.
• He swiftly and diligently turns people against each other. He establishes a culture of every-man-for-themselves-trust-no-one-everyone-wants-to-steal-lie-and-turn-you-in-get-your-guns-and-prepare-to-fight. I am here to tell you from experience that this is not democracy, folks! This is not freedom!  You’ll be left not only without freedom but without humanity. And dignity. Without respect.
• He builds literal walls to separate people. The Germans walled in the Jews in Warsaw and then walled out the free Berlin from the communist one.
• Truth tellers are silenced and ordered to be quiet, on account of not betraying secrets of state, but in truth, these are secrets of personal issues that would only incriminate the president and his clique. Another big, huge lie they love to tell is “this is for the good of the country”. Who can rebut that?! In fact, it’s only for the good of their abusing the power.
• He promotes an active agenda to shut out all other countries to allegedly focus on our own. This gives a false sense of patriotism. People are not islands. And again, history (I know! The big H word!) has proven that we’re always stronger together and no nation can exist in a void. You isolate because you’re hiding something awful. Anyone with a toddler will tell you that silence from a bedroom always means trouble.
• One of the last steps is the idea to introduce ‘patriotic education’ in schools to allegedly teach the history and truth of the country. This is the first step into making his own propaganda a mandatory subject in schools, planting it in the young minds that will later lead his way. Trust me, I learned that propaganda in all my formative years in school and my mother was forced under the penalty of death to teach it. It never taught me the “history of the country”. It only taught me he is the one and only and the almighty.
• They sow the belief that science is bad. Truth is: science makes you think. Thinking is bad in an authoritarian regime. Thinking undermines power.
• The purpose of speeches and news conferences that he leads are not to share news, but to spread propaganda. Everything they do, every move, every visit, every gesture is diabolically, minutely calculated to ensure that people know who the boss is and who has the supreme power. The only viable (for them) politics they perform is that of intimidation and ensuring people see them as the supreme force. Narcissism and not empathy is their main trait of character for such a leader. 
• Nowhere since communism have I felt that my life has no value, no meaning at all. Authoritarianism makes you feel that the simple whim of one person, a simple tantrum can make or break the fate of the entire population of the country. That no decision I make, or anyone else for that matter, will change in any way what happens to my life, to my livelihood and my well-being.
• Demonizing everyone who is not him: the media, the political opponents, the activists who want to create awareness – everyone but himself and the family is perceived as evil and a threat.
• America has a more complicated web of litigiousness that the old-school dictators did not have to worry about. In America, he must cover all traces of all wrong doings by demanding everyone in touch with his person and family to sign non-disclosure agreements. For now. Sudden imprisonment for alleged crimes against himself will follow. The threats of that have been already planted.
• Some people that do talk and show proof of their accounts are never backed up, their testimonies not confirmed and then you start doubting the media who reports the facts, when, really the manipulation from the source is the problem. 
• They create chaos so people cannot tell fiction from fact.
• And I could go on … but I stop here and thanks for making it this far.

·       Americans, from their ivory towers, cannot understand that this is not a Democrat vs Republican affair any longer. As mentioned before: there is no such thing left in America as political discourse. There is no more "let's respectfully disagree." The only thing left to argue about in today's America is this, as I see it: do we want to remain a democracy and continue to work on our problems of which we have many, many wounds and bleeding scars that must be tended to and healed, and finally strive to be the leader of democracy, peace and fairness in the world or do we allow one person, one family, one clique of opportunists to turn us all into their enablers, take us centuries behind in history, and to a place where we will eventually be starved, in extreme poverty and with no independence of thought, with no humanity and dignity to speak of, or worse? This is not political discourse. This is survival. Are Americans too ignorant, too wrapped-up in their everyday smallness of social media and love of reality TV to see the clear, legible writing on the walls and do something about it?! 

One fact I have witnessed over the almost 23 years of being in America is that they took so much out of schools that they turned America into stupid, science-deaf people with no critical thinking.

During communism I didn’t understand how this poisonous group of people led by an evil-minded criminal became powerful and the sole ruler of a country, crushing millions of individuals under their shoe. But the Revolution taught me that only the voice of people, standing together, united, with no arms other than their fists and voice boxes could overturn it.

America has not lived nor are they, as a collective, interested in learning about the tragedy of the Holocaust and of an authoritarian communist regime and might find it impossible to relate. But if that’s not bad enough, they also have a herd amnesia to their own history too. They can’t and won’t remember their own genocide of the Native Americans and the crimes of centuries against African Americans. By not learning, by not knowing, by not paying attention, America is bound for a tragedy. America is already living the early dawn of that tragedy.

I guess somewhere between chasing those rockets and eating those burgers America lost its way and its identity, if it ever truly had one, given that they didn’t resolve their own conflicts, but deepened them. I wished it then, listening to the man from Texas at my university, and I wish it now more than ever: America should finally, at least now, in what seems to be the final hour of a bleeding, wounded democracy, wake up and give a crap about history. The one they can learn from and the one they are building for their future generations. 

My Heart Is Bleeding

People occasionally ask me, or ask generally in groups I am part of, “how is everyone?”. And today more than ever I am grateful for people like that who stop to ask. I am finding out more and more each day that it’s harder and harder to think of others, which is quite the opposite of what the world needs now. If anything, we need more compassion, more togetherness, less vile-ness and definitely, infinitely more respect. So, if you’re reading this: how are you?! Drop me a note, comment on this link – whatever you feel comfortable with … How are you?

To answer those who have asked: we are doing fine. Our hearts are bleeding and our minds are wound up with concern and worry and fright of what tomorrow might bring or how today might morph into something worse, but we are, generally speaking, in the scheme of things, fine. We have been grateful that we and our immediate families are healthy, protected from harm and those of us who work have kept their jobs. These are not small blessings.

But my heart is bleeding, a little more each day. I just cannot believe that all the evil of the world has decided to all come out at the same time all in one year. Every day I am more and more stunned by how everything, and everyone is falling apart. I knew the world needed “a  moment”, needed an inspiration, needed a hero, and a purpose, but  I never dreamed that that moment would be all evil, all dirty, all dark and inhumane, all hopeless, a big whirlpool of vitriol, poison, and desperation.

Tonight is one of those nights where I cannot stop my blood pressure from climbing because my heart is bleeding for everything around me … These are only a handful of things that I can think of right now that make my heart bleed. Every day. 

My heart’s been bleeding for the soul of the American nation, for the loss of the values they hold dear. For how our troubled past is following us into our present. A past that I thought we left behind for good.

My heart has been bleeding for the loss of humanity and respect in our country, at every level but especially at the leadership level. There are days when I see no end to it. My heart’s been bleeding for the injustices I witness every day, whether viewing them on TV, or reading about them, or hearing them retold by my friends. My heart’s been bleeding for all the innocent people being killed and gassed in our streets; my heart’s been bleeding for the death of the belief that “every person is innocent before proved guilty”, the policy of firing a gun to everything that stands in one’s way before better judgement is applied. My heart has been bleeding for the useless violence in our world. Every day.

My heart’s been bleeding for those who die or suffer life-long complications from Covid19. My heart’s been bleeding for not being able to see my family. Not being able to know when seeing my family will eventually be possible. When this exile will end.

My heart’s bleeding for all those who have kids to feed and lost their jobs to the Covid19 depression. My heart’s bleeding for every business owner closing their business, their dream, because they can’t pay the bills anymore.

My heart’s been bleeding for all those who take a knee.

My heart’s bleeding for all those killed in fires caused by a raging climate. My heart’s bleeding for all those who try to teach us to be better and get laughed in the face, dismissed.

My heart’s been bleeding for those stuck at the border, trapped in cages like animals, with no respect to their humanity. When all they wanted was to be free …

My heart’s been bleeding for all the babies dragged away from their parents …

My heart’s bleeding for all those who don’t read anything except for Facebook and Twitter … Especially those who also have the power to change things for good.

My heart’s been bleeding for the loss of our critical thinking. And of compassion.

My heart’s been bleeding after driving around in several counties this weekend and seeing 80% (my humble estimation, it could very well be more) of the electoral signs having the wrong person’s name on them. It’s not the wrong person because it’s wrong to me. I seldom, if ever, make an absolute truth statement, but this is an absolute truth statement: it is the wrong person, if you have one ounce of decency and humanity left in your body. 80%. My heart and eyes are bleeding ….

My heart is still bleeding for losing John McCain. My heart bleeds for losing RBG.

And tonight, I add my beautiful Armenian friends to this list of horrible tragedies that make my soul bleed and my heart stop … I have worked with the folks from our Armenian office for close to ten years now. They are beautiful, smart like I have never met before, selfless, and fragile people. The thought of losing coworkers or their families to their mandatory draft to fight the recent war against Azerbaijan there makes me scream … Some of these people are close friends, part of a larger family I hold dear to my soul. My heart bleeds for them tonight, too … Regardless of which side you're on, the civilians of a country, the ones who ultimately suffer more because they didn't invite the evil in, are always the wrong ones to pay the cost of it. And that makes my heart bleed ... 

I don’t ask “what else can go wrong this year”, because I know: a lot can still go very, very wrong. This moment, I don’t ask for much. I just watch everything helplessly and pray that humanity will find its way …

I was in an online seminar recently and they reminded me of something that I think about tonight, as I write this: “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it--always.” (Gandhi)

Tonight, I think of this. And I pray that I one day, in my lifetime, I see this become truth …