Frosty End of Year Musings

 I hope this finds you looking forward to 2022 with hope. January starts tomorrow, a month named after Janus, the god of gates and doors. Janus had two faces in order to look forward and backwards at the same time. And as we move into the new year, we can't help but look back at last year and compare it with plans for the next. 

For me, 2021 started out with a total shut down in London and flight cancellations disrupting travel. School went back online, and I battled COVID throughout February and March. The summer hinted of normal times with family gatherings and nature walks in the great outdoors. In the fall school in Abuja continued as normal and we all appreciated the opportunity to travel for a week in October.  It wasn't until December that we started to feel the effects of the virus again.  Positive tests again disrupted travel, and we considered ourselves fortunate to make the trip to the subfreezing temperatures and warm celebrations in Minnesota. 

Plans for 2022 consist of a series of question marks. Will our travel plans go ahead as planned? How will the virus affect school this spring? Where will we be headed come June? There have been times when this indefinite future would crush me. However, I believe I am learning to live with uncertainty.  The trick is to see how events and plans stand relative to the bigger picture.

Another arctic freeze is blowing in to Minnesota. The world has turned white and frosty. With relatively mild temperatures, which means not too far below freezing, I decided to go for a walk in the winter wonderland.  The snow lacks color, but it provides contrast and emphasizes details of individual pine needles, twisting twigs, grasses and the tracks of each bird, rabbit and pet. And when the cold wind blows, each individual snowflake floats away. Ordinary objects are frosted and bedazzled. And the whiteness is all the more appealing seen through the windows of a warm kitchen.

I am not traveling on safari in South Africa, nor am I on a beach in the Seychelles. But I am with family, well fed and within reach of anything I might need.  Within days I will need to start navigating the COVID guidelines once again, and I expect to find delays and changes of plans. But I will take each setback one at a time, trying to find the silver (frosty) lining of each cloud. I can say, at last, " I am at peace."

COVID is a **** Nuisance

 

When the corona virus was first detected we hid at home and worried when the vaccine would come and let us out. With the COVID 19 vaccine, we had new worries: the anti-vaxxers and if the vaccine would protect us from the Delta variant. But most people's reaction to the Omicron variant is frustration.  

Our school went from distance learning, to a hybrid schedule allowing small groups of students on campus, to a total free for all. Not wanting to upset parents, the administration kept new cases concealed and assured everyone that a vaccine protected from exposure and masks prevented the spread of COVID.  Still, there was no real reason for inviting everyone back on campus for celebrations and sports events other than we had stopped believing in any harmful effects of the virus.

Omicron did throw a spanner in the works by affecting our travel plans for the Christmas break. Those planning a safari in Africa quickly changed their plans fearing they might get stranded when governments started banning flights in and out of certain countries. Nigeria was already on the banned country list (something that was reversed weeks later) and politics called for reverse banning of other countries into Nigeria. Most of the staff had decided to go home because, as one teacher explained, they can't prohibit a citizen from returning to their own country. Turns out, they can.

Both the US and Canada now require a negative test within 24 hours of departure on inbound flights.

This was nuisance #1: testing here in Abuja is expensive and can take anywhere up to 4 days before results are available. We have had to rebook flights and retake tests before, and it can make travel very stressful. Many of the staff were panic calling the clinic in order to get their results and make their flights.

Then the first positive test came in. We assumed it must be a mistake, there were no symptoms. But when the next 12 people tested positive, we accepted the fact that we would not be flying home. Nuisance #2: With severe symptoms like I have experienced before, I would not mind missing Christmas.  But the mild, almost nonexistent, symptoms of Omicron make our frustrated travel plans much harder to bear. 

So we sit in our apartment, bags still packed, no food in the refrigerator, and wonder how we will fill our days. I am not sick, but I'm told to stay indoors and cannot travel. I don't know what the answer is, but I do know we can't ignore COVID and hope it will go away. 

Happy Holidays? It will be a humble Christmas for me this year, not unlike that of the first one with a mother who couldn't get home and gave birth in a cattle shed.