One Year Anniversaries

If you're like me, we are fast approaching a time of 1 year anniversaries, and mine will be anniversaries of the last time I did something:  rode in a plane, went to a conference, set out treats for students, got a haircut in a salon, canceled a get together.  A year ago, I wrote this blog post.  I'm almost sure it's the first time I mentioned the new virus which would be named COVID-19 in a blog post.

A year ago today, I wrote, "On the way back home, I heard news reports of the new corona virus that's burning its way through China; we now have more people infected with this new virus than those infected with SARS during the 2002-2003 outbreak. The World Health Organization will meet today. If we were characters in a movie, ominous music would be playing."

Yes indeed, the ominous music was playing; others probably heard it first a week earlier when the Chinese government shut down the town of Wuhan and some other smaller towns in the region.  I remember hearing it on the news and assuming it was because China is a repressive regime, not because it was a disease control measure.  I remember wondering how the citizens in the town would make ends meet if they couldn't go to work or school.  I couldn't imagine.

And now I know--most of us aren't making ends meet very well or at all, unless we have an assortment of resources.

Some days we notice that we're standing on a threshold or passing in/through something significant, and usually, there's no music to cue us.  Yesterday I hauled a literal carload of boxes to Good Will.  My campus has a lease on classrooms on the 3rd and 4th floor of our building which expires tomorrow.  Yesterday, the movers came to take big items like tables, chairs, and large screen televisions back to the Ft. Lauderdale campus.  We still had some little stuff, even after we relocated the office supplies and materials we'll need before the campus closes, which will probably happen later this year.

Seasonal decorations comprised much of what was left.  The Corporate team told us that those items wouldn't go to Ft. Lauderdale, and we should just dispose of it.  I picked through it and saved some of the better stuff:  some autumnal wreathes and garlands, some small Christmas trees, a string of lights.  Because the thought of throwing the rest of the decorations in the trash made me so sad, I loaded the rest in my car (and it occurs to me--that's why my back aches this morning!).

Will people show up at thrift stores looking for these decorations?  Some of them are very bedraggled.  I do realize that the Good Will people may throw them away, and I'm fine with that.  I just want someone else to be the judge of whether or not they still have worth.

Since I was in loading up the car mode yesterday, I loaded some boxes with paper recycling into my car and took them home to put them in my home recycling bin.  I caught sight of one piece of paper written in red marker:  "If we need more hot cocoa packets or peppermint sticks, please see Dr. K."

I tried not to cry, as I remembered a winter festival that I helped organize at school, back in Dec. of 2019, before we knew a new disease was coming for us, before we knew we were losing our campus.