{"id":18622,"date":"2020-03-15T16:42:59","date_gmt":"2020-03-15T23:42:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/?p=18622"},"modified":"2020-04-14T08:16:17","modified_gmt":"2020-04-14T15:16:17","slug":"embrace-hunkering-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/2020\/03\/embrace-hunkering-down\/","title":{"rendered":"Embrace “hunkering down”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Good grief!  Here we are in a place I doubt most of us have ever been:  a global health crisis \u2026 a pandemic.  And while here in the U.S. we are not (at least not as of this writing) an epicenter, we are also certainly not an outlier.  Mostly, I don\u2019t think we know where we are given the lack of testing compared to other parts of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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At my house, it is pretty much \u201cas usual\u201d.  I\u2019ve worked from a home office for nearly 35\nyears.  As of this writing, I have no\nindication that my work will be disrupted, but I am not counting on that at\nall, at all and given that I did not work for 4.5 months last year, my reserves\nare not much so spending is currently for necessities only.  But, my pantry, frig and freezer are full,\nfull, full \u2013 mostly thanks to the fact that I keep them that way over Winter\nand was just starting to think about \u201ceating down\u201d when things changed.  So, I continue the Winter grocery shopping\nparadigm.  And fortunately, I have not\nyet experienced much in the way of shortage locally \u2026 well, T.P. and hand\nsanitizer but I got a jump on the T.P. and I\u2019m a soap and water person with a\nhome water well so was not in the sanitizer market anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As far as getting ill, I have low exposure:  I work from home, I don\u2019t belong to groups\nand my main socialization is via the internet. \nI am truly grateful for my internet connections!  Also for several wonderful neighbors as well\nas some townsfolk and small business relationships.  I feel incredibly fortunate in that I am both\nused to and prefer a somewhat hermit-like lifestyle.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The worst thing I ever worry about is my animal companions.  Emmett and Auggie are well and in addition to\nthe human foodstuffs in pantry and freezer, there is extra for them as well \u2013\nthanks Chewy.com!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I will say that Auggie-boy gave me a few more white hairs\nthis past week when he pulled a late night \u2026 1:00 a.m. arrival!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Sleeping off a very late night of ???<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Completely out of character and routine and I don\u2019t\nknow:  he got shut in somewhere, treed by\nsomething, extra cat business \u2026 GAH!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Otherwise, I have read the science and the scientist\nrecommendations:  social distancing, wash\nyour hands \u2026 wash your hands \u2026 wash your hands. \nAll easy and doable for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other than the pets, my worries are for people who do not\nhave the resources to withstand the 60-90-120 days of whatever they must deal\nwith:  work from home, no work, kids out\nof school, small business loss \u2026 and all of the trickle down affects of a\ndrastic change in lifestyle:  work, play\n\u2026 life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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All of that said \u2026 \nand I would not wish this virus or any of the negative affects on anyone\n\u2026 still, it is here and we must go forward as best we can \u2026 there may be some\nincredible things that come of this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                The recognition that we do NOT need quite as many \u201cpublic\u201d events:  think of the $$$$ that are spent for political campaigning \u201cin person\u201d that we might now see happen virtually \u2026 and not only that kind of event, but also other business marketing events.  Do we really need to fly here there and everywhere to some conference, spending an inordinate amount of carbon budget when we could do just as well with a virtual event?  I.E. might we accomplish some climate change goals as we come to terms with dealing with the global health crisis?  Just imagine!!!  Greta Thunberg writes eloquently on this topic and has encouraged \u201conline\u201d climate strikes during this time of required social distancing, i.e. no gatherings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                The\nrecognition that many of us do NOT need to work from an \u201coffice\u201d or other work\nlocation.  In the last 10 years of my\nwork from home life, the amount of work we accomplish as a team via\ncollaborative software:  Zoom,\nGoToMeeting, Webinars \u2026  I am so used to\nworking with others via the internet that I don\u2019t even think about travelling\nfor any work reason. BUT, even the technical world is not completely ready \u2026\nissues of security :  https:\/\/www.msn.com\/en-us\/news\/us\/silicon-valley-was-first-to-send-workers-home-its-been-messy\/ar-BB11b9vj?ocid=spartandhp<\/a>\n  In my personal tech world, we talk\nsecurity ALL.THE.TIME, but we do not deal with extremely sensitive date or\nprotocol, so I definitely see issues with a lot of businesses.  But, those can and will be resolved \u2026 remotely!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                The\nrecognition that even socially, we *can* keep in touch via Facetime, Skype and\nother virtual solutions.  I am not\nadvocating zero face to face\/in person socialization, but especially in this\nkind of crisis and even as we all live further apart \u2026 there are earth friendly\noptions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Telemedicine!  This option has been available to me from my clinic as well as my insurer.  What a great option!  So many times, I would like to provide information, receive guidance and onward!  Not only with my physician, but also my veterinarian.  Both have been good with this, but with my vet \u2026 things are not in place to allow fees.  As a consultant, who works on a $\/hour, I have zero issues with being charged for phone\/email\/info exchange time and would rather do that than subject myself and\/or my animal companions to a visit if not necessary.  Currently, drive-through COV-19 test sites are being set up\/tested \u2026 I am unclear how far along they are, but WOW \u2026 wonderful innovation and adaptation to challenging times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Earth friendly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I do not have children and so also no grandchildren, that will be impacted by the atrocious decisions made by me and my generation.  But, I still wish to do what I can to mitigate the damage and inspire others to do what they can as well:  fossil fuel reduction, plastic\/poly reduction, over consuming \u2026 I keep thinking that I\u2019ve gone \u201cgreen\u201d and then I find that other thing that I use\/buy\/send to landfill \u2026it is crazy-hard, but I believe, absolutely necessary that we all do as much as we can.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The future is at stake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Greta Thunberg says: \n\u201cour house is on fire\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is! \u2026 and we need to stop thinking that the future will take care of itself.  It will NOT unless we, all of the people on the planet Earth, educate ourselves on the science of the current global health crisis as well as the climate change crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We must change how we consume, how we live and interact.  That is, if we hope that planet Earth\ncontinues to be viable for future generations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I realize that there are different views on how we do this.  I don\u2019t intend to get into those.  There is a lot of information available on\noptions:  food choices, product packaging\nawareness, travel options \u2026 and the impact of all of our choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, I think we all have opportunities to think of others.  If we are in a comfortable spot \u2026 is there a\nneighbor who is not?  Can we offer to share\nitems or help someone get items?  And for\nthose of us who currently do not have interruption of income or internet \u2026 how\ncan we help someone who might have those issues?  In a time, when maybe our normal\n\u201centertainment\u201d is disrupted \u2026 good golly \u2026 so much opportunity to think about\nhow to help other people, to learn something new, to explore something that we\nhave not because there did not seem to be time to do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is difficult to remain positive all of the time as our “normal” existence has been so drastically altered with the added uncertainty of how long it might go on. I think it is important, now at the beginning, to think how I can\/will combat frustration, anxiety-depression at not being able to do things as I’d like.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can focus on all of the things that we cannot do \u2026. OR we can focus on all of the things that we CAN do. I am making a list of things I CAN do to keep in front of me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It is a challenging and sometimes scary time, but there are\nalso incredible opportunities to learn, to help, to consider change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Good grief!  Here we are in a place I doubt most of us have ever been:  a global health crisis \u2026 a pandemic.  And while here in the U.S. we are not (at least not as of this writing) an epicenter, we are also certainly not an outlier.  Mostly, I don\u2019t think we know where […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,35,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-auggie","category-emmett","category-front-porch-musings"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18622"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18622\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18713,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18622\/revisions\/18713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beardogco.com\/theroadhome\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}