I keep a fervid eye on my toilet paper rolls. I wonder how many my daughter has, but at the same time, I don't want to know, because there simply isn't any more to buy in the stores. What the hell is THAT all about?
I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about what my picky grandson will eat when they run out of his favorite food. I wonder if our great-granddaughter has enough formula. For crying out loud, get a grip, woman!
I am not complaining, I'm commiserating. We are all going through this together, all around the world. And I have it easy. I can stay home.
In addition to doctors and nurses, my current heroes are hospital and nursing home janitors and cooks. I'm grateful for the trash collectors I see out there, and the delivery people who bring us goods. I appreciate my postman who continues to bring my mail. I feel for clerks behind counters at grocery stores and pharmacies, underpaid, overexposed, and unable to take time off. Farm workers!
We all take pride in our work, but it is humbling to discover just who the "essential service workers" are.
I read a story about a young father crying in the grocery store, holding his infant. He couldn't find any formula. Does anyone know how to make your own? Didn't our mothers do that in the 1950's?
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| This statue is of a vineyard worker in Napa Valley, California. |
This is such a weird time, isn't it? Sorry your visit got postponed, but of course it makes sense. I wouldn't worry about your grandson. I suspect if he gets hungry enough he'll eat.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, there are so many people still at the front lines, dealing with the public. At least this isn't a terrible virus for younger people, the way the Spanish Flu was.
Yes, that is definitely something to be thankful for.
DeleteThese are trying times for all of us. I lie awake thinking about my daughter, a phlebotomist, and my 2 granddaughters, both nurses working on the front lines. My eldest granddaughter has her own health problems. She had a stroke several months ago.I pray this nightmare ends sooner rather than later.
ReplyDeleteI do, too. It is so awful.
DeleteThings here are quiet since social isolation is pretty much how we always live out in the country. I've noticed extra acts of kindness in the few times I've been out. People hold the door at the post office so that only one of us going in or out at once has to touch the handle. People are loading groceries for the elderly at the grocery store. The local pharmacies and grocery stores are arranging deliveries of groceries and medicines for folks who are at risk and have no one to help them cope. I do feel for the folks with kids to feed and entertain but here life goes on as usual. The real heroes are the grocery store clerks, the pharmacy workers and the medical staff at the hospitals. Just keep your fingers crossed my niece the 1st year pharmacy student doesn't volunteer to help at the pharmacy she works at each summer.
ReplyDeleteMy fingers are crossed, Chilly.
DeleteThere's been a massive raid on toilet rolls in the UK too. I've asked several people if they can explain it (the virus doesn't affect the stomach or digestive system), but they were as mystified as me.
ReplyDeleteI'm full of admiration for all the health workers who continue to do their jobs despite the extra workload the virus is creating, when the NHS was already on its knees because of under-funding and staff shortages. How they stand the stress I really don't know.
It takes a special kind of person to devote their life to helping others. I admire them so much.
DeleteThese days... oh these unbelievable days... they either bring out the best or worst in people. It is mind-blowing in every way.
ReplyDeleteIndeed. My mind is quite blown.
DeleteI've thanked a store clerk and the post office clerk. Don't know that they felt better. I hadn't considered picky eater children. I recall my daughter telling her children, You eat what you get and don't have a fit. She learned it from her mother. As to formula, I remember my mother making formula for my sister, in 1953 and 1954. It involved water and condensed milk. I made formula, too. Similac in water. But that's not the same as condensed milk. I probably would have been upset not finding it.
ReplyDeleteI googled "How did mother's feed their babies in the 1950s?" and up came all sorts of interesting historical information. If I had a baby right now I think I'd order a couple dozen cloth diapers, diaper pins, and a few plastic pants. Assuming those are still offered for sale someplace.
DeleteThese are crazy times Colette. I am working hard to not let my brain go to extremes but it can be difficult. Wish Obama was at the helm.
ReplyDeleteObama! Wouldn't that be wonderful? I can almost remember when life was reasonably normal.
DeleteLook, I lived through WW2. Aged 5 - 10 I wasn't at the height of my intellectual powers as I am now but I recognised that unrelieved gloom would be a destructive mono-diet. We didn't just hate Adolf, we laughed at him. To Colonel Bogey,the tune made even more famous in the movie Bridge Over the River Kwai, we sang:
ReplyDeleteHitler has only got one ball,
Göring has two but very small,
Himmler
Was very similar,
While poor old Goebbels
Had no balls at all.
Which is why I maintain we are presently suffering from the Trumpian Plague.
If you think the vocabulary or the sentiments of the lyrics above may offend the sensibility of your readers feel free to use the Delete button. And erect a sign: "Look what testicular inadequacy did for them."
As my Tennessee Grandma would say, "Lord a mercy!" and then she would shake her head with a very small, but telling smile on her face. Thanks for the laugh.
DeleteI too am keeping a fervid Eye on my TP since there is no more to be found anywhere. We live in a Desert so broad leaf Trees aren't an alternative and what we have isn't Bum friendly. *Winks* With the inept Administration being so far behind and reacting only with public pressure once everything has gone sideways instead of being proactive and Leading, I am not exceedingly confident they've Got This. My internal clock is jacked up with Sheltering in Place and having no real schedule now... plus the Anxiety is always underlying and just there, how could it not be, Right?
ReplyDeleteRight!
Delete