Merry Christmas from My Friend Mary Ann

Photo credit:  Lyn Fenwick

I know that Christmas letters are often the butt of jokes, but they would not be if they were all written by our friend Mary Ann Marko!  She has given me permission to share her 2020 Christmas letter on my blog, and you are in for a treat!  (Only the images are mine.)

What to Make of a Covid Year

From January whisperings about a strange disease in a faraway land, to March when things began to look ominous, to the present, which finds us engulfed in a world pandemic, we have all taken a ride through some kind of a Sci-Fi horror movie.  Now we come into this season of gratitude and try to conjure up something we can to be thankful for.  No matter what, I will always be grateful for the moon, elephants, and cottonwood trees.  I am also grateful for the optimists who try to fill our cup at least half full with their postings of stunning sunsets, blooming flowers, jokes that force a smile, and photos of happy days.  We long to be with family and friends during this season, but are thankful for our warm, safe house to weather out this virus storm.  We are grateful, too, for Zoom that lets us at least see the faces we long to touch--to hold their hands.

Photo credit:  Lyn Fenwick

Sheltering at home has brought its own set of challenges.  Those dreams of long ago, when life was a frenzy of even a few hours alone with my sweetie, have turned to accusations of stalking.  (He says he was just trying to put the clothes away.)  We stop.  Regroup.  Find ways to make space for each other, seal the deal with a kiss, and carry on.

When the news unnerves us, we remember we have Netflix, with the Tiger King and that chess girl, and The Crown.  We open another puzzle; read another book.  Our yearning for sweets triumphs over any resolution to eat healthy.  Kale and carrots do not do what Twin Bings and Blue Bell ice cream can do to tamp down the stress and sooth the spirit.  

We stay up late and get up late.  We bring in the paper with its predictable bad news, drink coffee, scroll face book, and now it's noon.  Lunch.  I need a nap.  Billy Collins reads poems to us in the afternoons and Heather Cox teaches us history lessons.  OLLI offers courses on line--very good ones--and I remember to tune into about half of them.  I have learned about flying buttresses, Neanderthals, viruses, crocodile, and all manner of animals and insects, how my brain functions, and how Google plays with it.  I have learned more about the constitution, and how, like the Bible, it can be manipulated to fit most anything one chooses to believe.  In searching for truth, I have learned to question everything I ever thought I knew.

Irregular adherence to safety measures keeps us home from church, grocery store, and everywhere else.  And so, we watch Mass on television (with coffee and cinnamon roll), order groceries, and everything else on line--staying safe, we hope.

Yesterday on my walk, I saw a neighbor's yard strung with bedding, and chairs sitting outdoors with a basket of disinfectants beside them.  My husband tells me there was an ambulance there when he came home from PT.  We hunker down even tighter.

Photo credit: Lyn Fenwick & Emy

If we travel next year (a vaccine and a thumb's up from Dr. Fauci being the key to our traveling), it will be to memorial services that are increasing, as is the pain of not being able to share the grief with family and friends in real time.

The giant poinsettia gifted us by a friend to usher in the season will be all the decoration we need for this year.  I am eagerly waiting for the stores to stock candied fruit so I can make fruitcake--I'm ready to open that apricot brandy.

We will spend Christmas home alone, happy in the knowledge we are protecting our families, and they us.  We await the Baby in a Manger to lighten all our burdens.  And when this year comes to a close, we will celebrate its departure by stomping on something and then banging pots and pans while demanding a new and vastly improved 2021!

My thanks to these special friend of ours, Mary Ann, for sharing her humor and wisdom, and to her husband, Gene, for providing her with such great material.  May the Holiday Season bring all our friends and blog followers the grace and humor of this message, and may the new year bring us kindness and health.   

Two Special Blog Followers

 The challenges of Covid-19 have reminded  us just how important friends are.  I am certainly appreciative of my friends, made so visible by their support for my book and by their continued following of my blog.  And, I must add, the appreciation of staying in touch through many years with their annual Christmas cards and letters, and the new novelty of zoom.  I have missed seeing or hearing from others, as the opportunities which would have allowed us to stay in touch in the past are now impossible.

Many of us have stayed in touch through face book, and others have followed my blog.  This week's blog shares the fun of both ways I have connected with friends.

What fun to open my face book reminder about Isaac Werner's construction of a neighbor's house, posted December 10, 2020, to discover that somebody "Loved It."

Unfortunately for me, they loved it so much they wanted more information about the county section number, information that I did not have.  My blog had only indicated the general direction and distance from Isaac's claim.  While I was considering how to reply, I realized someone else had answered the question.

That was a relief, since my research records compiled while writing the book focus more on Stafford County legal descriptions, although Isaac had many friends and business acquaintances in Pratt County.

However, what it also reminded me was how much is now available online that I needed to use other reference sources to find when I was doing my research.  The conversation between my two face book friends had not only shared the certificate number and date of issue , but also an image of the certificate.

My information about this particular topic had come from Isaac's journal, a rare source material that included the number of days the construction took and the amount Isaac was paid for his labor.  I had also interviewed a family descendant, which was helpful in distinguishing for whom the work was done, since two brothers had the same surname and lived in the same community.  However, since the Moore brothers were friends but not major characters in my book, I did not take the time to go further.  My face book friends found the information online in no time at all.

 However, this story does not end.  An image of the location was also supplied before I had time to praise the two online sleuths for sharing their research.  

In past blogs I have commented on the disappointments that technology has brought to communication--the extreme rarity of a personal letter, the greater likelihood that people will correspond by text that by e-mail, and the rarity of a chatty phone call.  

Yet, this face book exchange illustrates the other side of technology.  Three people shared information, and the chain of the conversation was not begun by a request.  Perhaps that is one part of the technology that is overlooked.  I posted my blog without any expectation that I would receive information that I didn't have, and unexpectedly, all three of us learned something new.

The challenge to all of us, young and old, is to discover and utilize the new possibilities, but to do so without the loss of benefits from the old possibilities.  If nothing else, the Covid-19 isolation has shown us that we miss the smiles behind the masks (and bless us for wearing those!), we miss the impromptu meetings with friends at the grocery store, and we miss the traditional rituals that bring strangers together--the clerks in stores, the strangers we are seated beside at programs and sporting events, the distant relatives at family reunions...  If Covid-19 should have taught us anything, it should have reminded us that privilege and class mean nothing to the virus, and neither should our sadness for those the virus has taken.  If we have missed those impromptu connections with friends, acquaintances, and strangers, perhaps we have also learned the significance of smiles, thank yous, and traditional courtesies (like holding the door for someone whose hands are full).  And, like remembering the common humanity in all of us.   

Defining Courage

Credit:  Lyn Fenwick, artist

As Covid-19 sweeps around the globe, ignoring national boundaries, I do my part by doing nothing but staying at home.  Weeks ago I sat at my sewing machine to make masks for my husband and  me.  It takes no courage to simply do my part in avoiding infection...to confront this stealthy killer by hiding from him in my home.  Yet, for most of us that is the simple responsibility we are asked to assume.  Stop the spread by avoiding becoming a transmitter of the virus to others.

For many others, they lack the luxury of retreat.  They are on the front lines in this war.  They are the ones whose courage deserves our eternal respect.  They are the ones who are daily reminders of what courage is.

Credit: Lyn Fenwick, artist; Larry Fenwick, photograph

Courage is:  "...the quality shown by someone who decides to do something difficult or dangerous even though they be afraid."  Collins English Dictionary  They possess the "quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger, pain...the state or condition of being a hero."  The Free Dictionary

While most of us only need respect the importance of staying home and exercising the distancing required when we go out, the caregivers walk into the lions' dens every day across the nation.  I wanted to do something to honor them, and my private memorial is what I share in this post.  The days I spent at my drawing board were my way of thinking of them and their courage as they worked in hospitals
and other care facilities.

The fact that my portraits are only of medical personnel is not intended to ignore the many others who leave their homes to keep services available to the rest of us.  Courage is also "the ability to do something that frightens one."  Showing up to stock grocery shelves, to keep electrical power working, to deliver the mail, and to do the countless other things that keep needed services working are also heroic.

Detail. Credit:  Lyn Fenwick

But, there is something about the daily strength of medical personal to "withstand danger, fear, and difficulty" (Merriam-Webster), day after day, that seems beyond understanding for many of us.  Examples deserving of being shared involve two nurses from Olathe, KS who volunteered to leave their families and go to New York City to help. Both work in an orthopedic surgery facility, and because orthopedic surgery is elective, the clinic closed temporarily and they contracted to work in NYC.

Detail.  Credit:  Lyn Fenwick

Heather Smith says that she knew what she was going to face would be bad, but "the difference between 'knowing' and 'seeing' how bad it is are completely different things."  In an interview, she said she wants people to know "This is real.  It is not some hoax, and it can be deadly."  Paige Clinton Walters said upon her departure, "I can't wait to go help and save some lives!  But even more I can't wait to get back home safe and healthy."

This is the courage I honor in my drawing of Covid-19 Heroes.  It is a poor tribute to all the brave people risking their own health and lives for others, but it is sincerely offered.