I'm being robbed (of life)

But don’t call 9-1-1, call the Centers for Disease Control or whomever is responsible for this virus thing.  I am officially sick, gladly not with the virus but of the virus.  COVID-19 is openly stealing from my life.  It’s been more than two months that we have been “sheltering in place”, staying socially distant, wearing masks outside, and the biggest sacrifice yet, staying put.

And it’s not getting better yet.  We thought we were “flattening the curve” as the national news  promised, but instead Florida’s infected cases keep going up and as of this week we have earned the horrid title of being the epicenter of the disease in the USA.    Globally of course, we’re looking at 9 million infected with almost half a million deaths.  Not quite the numbers from the 1918 pandemic that ended up killing 50 million, but when you’re in the middle of it, and in the epicenter, it may actually feel worse.

This situation has already stolen from us about half of a year.  Twenty-twenty sounded good early on but as soon as it arrived, it has become a nightmare.   I started the year at the ripe age of 62.  It’s a great age to retire, to slow down to smell the flowers.  But not 2020, it started with a vengeance.  My father’s passing and my first Father’s Day without a father.   The excitement of researching and starting the process of getting a residence in La Condesa,  Mexico City as a big city hangout to visit a few times a year.  Lining up our ducks to start a life of freedom and enjoyment.  And then everything stopped.

Now, I have more time for writing, Uh hu!  I have more time to dream about travel. I have more time to look at maps, while I’m dreaming about travel.   Did I say I missed traveling?  What else is there?  Don't even want to think about it as I would dig myself even deeper into this COVID canyon.  In the meantime, we’ll wait for better times and do the best I can while we wait for the fog to lift off.  I hope it’s soon.

Ready or not, here we come!

It’s been a little over two months that we have been sheltering at home.  It’s even difficult to remember when it all started but I think it was some time in the middle of March.  I know that I felt sick from the regular flu as my father was hospitalized on the 1^st day of March, 2020.  I decided not to visit him at the hospital out of abundance of caution with the thought that I may have caught the virus in my way back from Mexico the week before.  When my father was taken home from Mercy Hospital on the 4^th, I was feeling better and decided to visit him on Thursday the 5^th of March.  He passed away on the 7^th and we arranged for the funeral services for Sunday the 15^th.  On that Sunday, we already had several cancellations from out of town visitors that could not travel because of the virus.  We had the funeral services without any inconvenience but we were warning everyone to minimize the hugs and hand-shaking, but very few listened to our warnings.  The obligatory stay at home orders came in the next week after that.  This means that as of this writing on the 17^th of May, 2020, we have been locked up about two months.

Most restaurants have been closed to sit-in clients so they have been relying on deliveries or pick ups.  Gyms and hair salons are completely closed.  Supermarkets are open and following social distance practices as best as they can.  The president keeps preaching that the virus is going to blow over anytime and him and many of his supporters have been advocating to save the economy even at the risk of a few extra infections.  State governors and city mayors are under increased pressure from above and from some groups to open up so most of the country is getting ready to open by tomorrow Monday and we will hope for the best from here on out.  Meanwhile the coronavirus numbers today show that there have been almost 5 million infected worldwide with over 315,000 deaths.  The USA still leads the statistics with more than 1.5 million infected and 90,789 deaths in the last two months. Those are not light numbers to feel relaxed about, but folks are feeling the weight of the unemployed and the closed economy and are ready to get out regardless.

At home, we are getting used to the new ways.  We used to travel a lot more and now I just virtually travel looking at maps or photos from exotic locations.  Our lives in Miami used to revolved around work and our businesses, and we have moved passed those things so retirement came to us ready or not and now are coping with adapting ourselves to be home for the most part.  The highlights of the week are to take care of our grandchildren on Mondays and walk to the grocery store for food at least once a week.  Social life used to be mostly with family, so we now talk more by phone or video and less in person.  No one is allowed in our different buildings so we have not had a visitor here since the New Year’s holidays. 

Ready or not tomorrow we open and we will probably take some cautious steps out to see how everyone is behaving and wait even longer to feel safe about being outside.  Travel is not on the cards right now but I will continue following roads on my electronic maps and looking at photos for exotic locations until the numbers start showing real improvements.  One thing is for sure, we will appreciate going outside again and we will enjoy any and every travel opportunity coming our way, and let’s hope its not too far in the future.

We are in this together… (really?)

As if we have become a new culture, we now must end every TV commercial or newscast with the phrase “we are in this together”.  Very sweet and thoughtful.  But if COVID-19 has made one thing abundantly clear in the world is that class differences hits people in different ways.  In the epicenter of the pandemic, New York City, there were reports that many NY residents fled to their summer “cottages” or to their Florida estates.

But even in our daily walks in our 33156 zipcode (Pinecrest), we see the estates, or as a friend of us calls them, the compounds.  Huge states with multiple rooms, on 5 acre lots with tennis courts, swimming pools and gardens that can easily compete with some major botanical gardens or state parks.  Our delight is just to walk by and admire the beauty visible from the street.  I can only imagine what goes on behind the fences or even deeper behind those walls.  

After being mesmerized for a few minutes as we walk in front of every estate, our only distraction is to get away from a passing truck or a pickup truck with a trailer.  Probably three of every four vehicles driving by are the folks that tend to the estate owners.  Many have ads on their vehicles that tell whether they are tending to their private swimming pools or manicuring gardens or taking care of sprinkler systems.  Those few that do not have ads on their vans are private citizens that when you see them stepping out of their vehicles to punch in the security codes of the driveway gates, are usually dressed in maid outfits or nurses’ aides visiting some of their clients.

This pandemic has certainly been an eye opener to all that may have been in denial.  We might be one country but there are two major distinct groups in America.  Those that rule and have most and those that serve the other group or barely get by while waiting for handouts.  Don’t tell me we are in this together.  Every socioeconomic group its on its own and each will pay a different price.  We can all shelter in place during this period but if you give me a choice, I’d much rather shelter in place in a 5 acre estate with enough space for a running track around your private lake with enough sports facilities to keep an high school entertained.  Instead, most of the service class has been deemed ‘essentials’ and now they don’t even have the choice of staying in their small spaces because they have to keep going to keep our lawns manicured, our pools cleaned, our supermarket shelves stocked and our hospitals fully staffed.

We are not all in this together.  Let’s don’t fool ourselves.  It’s a nice thought for those who have the time to think about it and talk about it.  But those that are busy keeping us going, don’t have the time or energy to realize how different it is for those that they serve.  There is always the hope that as things continue to change under COVID-19, appreciation for the services of the working classes will start being a factor of life in this United States of America.

Love in the Time of COVID-19

Saturday, April 25, 2020.  “Social distancing”, “we’re in this together”, “flattening the curve” and “shelter-in-place order”.  These and several other phrases are becoming the language of the “new normal” during the pandemic of 2020, and who knows for how much longer.  It’s been almost 2 months since our world began to change in response to the “Corona Virus December 2019”, now better known as COVID 19.  Today there are reports of 199,272 dead worldwide from almost 3 million infected.  In the USA we just went over 50,000 dead from the virus.  This is definitely higher than the worst of the typical flu season which kills about 30,000 in the US.

We are doing our part to stay safe and keep everyone we interact with safe.  We wear our face masks when in public places.  Only go out to the supermarket once a week and to our daily exercise walk through the lonely streets of our neighborhood, Pinecrest.  And we have been at it for over a month.

Lucky for us, we had just sold the bakery that we owned for 8 years on December 31th, so we have not faced the drop in sales and staff reductions that so many small businesses are dealing with.  Nor do we have regular employers that expect us to clock-in or at least work from home.  But we are still feeling the pain for the virus as about 50% of our tenants have already called that they will not have funds to pay their rents.  Some are tenants that have lost their jobs and some are shop owners like a hair salon and a female body waxing business that have been forced to close for almost 2 months.

We are not helping the economy with buying much outside the home.  Our only extra expenses are our Netflix, Hulu and Amazon memberships and an occasional book from Amazon or Abebooks.

We are eating well, sometimes a little more than we need to.  We are exercising every day.  We are keeping busy by reading and writing, organizing old photos and watching movies.  I really should not complaint.  There are others, especially in New York City, that are not only dealing with the economic impact of the virus, but are also dealing with their own health issues or with family members that are sick and even dying. 

On the other hand, after a month and a half of all this healthy living, everybody is ready to go back to where we were 2 months ago.  States are beginning to release the shelter-in-place rules beginning with Georgia and Tennessee which allowed bowling alleys, hair salons and tattoo parlors to open yesterday.  I tend to agree with business owners and folks that are trying to restore some of the normalcy, as long as they follow certain level of common sense.  The few business owners that I’ve seen being interviewed on CNN sound as if they are concerned for their health and their client’s well being, but are also thankful to be able to keep paying their employees for their work.  Everybody is watching.  On the other hand, Mr. Trump seems to be losing any sense of rationality he may have had at some point in his life.  He went as far as suggesting that scientists should test bleach or some other disinfectant as an internal cleanser.  He figures that if it cleans benches and chairs so well, why not human lungs and veins.  I don’t know how his supporters view this but from here it sounds like snake oil salesman or worse.

The toughest challenge for us has been the isolation from family and friends.  Video conferencing and phone calls can only go so far.  We are missing our grandsons dearly even though they live only 8 miles away.  In the last 2 months we have seen them a couple of times and both of those times have been maintaining the 6 feet of separation as shown in the photo above.  How much more will this virus steal from us?  Precious moments taken away to never return.  Children grow up and grandparents grow old.  The gap widens and those precious moments are gone forever.  What is a summer vacation without a trip with the grand-kids?  How long until we can hug them and laugh together?  I hope I can still smile when I read this entry in 6 months or a year from now.  Let's flatten that curve to oblivion!

Predicting the future

It’s easy to be pessimistic about the future when we are dealing with a new pandemic that is covered on the news 24x7.  Right now we don’t even know when we’ll be entering the tunnel, let alone see the light at it's end.  This pandemic might be new but the world has seen other episodes with infections diseases before.  I’m thinking of the black plague in the 1300s and the 1930 flu pandemic.  Those two took approximately a quarter of a million lives and at the time humanity didn’t know what they were dealing with nor did they have antibiotics or vaccines for those diseases.

The hope is that in the year 2020 we will figure this one out and that we will do a lot better than in previous plagues.  We have the technology on our side but with 7 billion of us on earth, we now have a lot higher density and greater mobility which are two huge factors going against us.

We are all fighting the virus by staying home, keeping to our social distancing, closing all venues that would normally fit 10 or more people and bringing leisure travel to a halt until we get over the hump.

How does the future look from here?  Which businesses will be affected temporarily and which ones could be changed forever?  The answers to this depend in part on how soon we are able to hold down this beast.  And that remains an open question.  As of today, April 7, 2020, COVID-19 has infected more than 1.5 million people and killed more than 87,000 worldwide. The question is when shall this be over?

A few facts to base my predictions:

·         -The virus is highly contagious and deadly;

·        - Most of us don’t have the antibodies against the virus;

·         -Researchers are looking for a vaccine but this could be a year away;

·         -There is no proven or effective treatment;

·        - People with underlining conditions (such as diabetes or asthma or heart disease) fair much worst than others.

My predictions:

I don’t see us getting back to the social mixing until at least a therapy or a vaccine become available.

June 2020:

A new rapid, portable, Corona Virus test kit becomes available.  People are allowed to start easing back to a “new normal”.   Face masks and gloves are no longer required at supermarkets.  Universities and schools plan to open in the fall, but students will need to be tested before returning.  Restaurants are allowed to reopen but with half as many tables as before -to keep social distancing-.  Restaurants have been improving their online food ordering and delivering and many are planning to continue taking advantage of that.  Airlines will be allowed to book travel for the fall but have to sanitize the planes between flights and keep planes half empty.  Professional and college level sport events have been cancelled until further notice.  The cruise line industry has come to a standstill with no sailings for the rest of 2020.

January 2021:

A cheap, simple, home-based Corona Virus test becomes available worldwide.  A new wave of Corona Virus infection is making authorities and medical personnel panic.  Newly elected President Biden is urging people to return to social distancing for 3 weeks.  Some workers are allowed to continue with proof of absence of exposure to the virus.  Restaurants are finding that they can do a lot more business online so many are dropping their expensive prime real estate.  The film industry has been working in high gear to fill a huge demand for home entertainment.  Stadiums sit empty.  The Cruise line industry plans to promote new lower density cruises to begin next summer, unknown if passengers will take them up on that.

June 2021:

Clinical trials results for new Corona Virus vaccine show promising results in humans.  The stock market soars with the news.

January 2022:

90% of the world population has been vaccinated with a new anti-COVID-19 vaccine.  People go out on the streets and party for a whole month.  Mardi Gras will return but only those with proof of no infections will be allowed on the streets of New Orleans.  Life returns to normal.

Should I go and buy my lottery tickets?  We'll re-read this in a year or two.

Life during the COVID-19 pandemic

As of today, Sunday April 5, 2020, more than 1.1 million people worldwide are confirmed to have been infected with the COVID-19 virus and 65,465 have died thus far.  We are by no means out of the woods and actually the expectations are that the situation will worsen significantly before it gets better.  The worst hit in the USA has been New York and even they are expecting numbers to worsen within the next couple of weeks.

A couple of days after I came back from Mexico City as my father was winding down, I came out with a flu out of nothing.  Maybe not sleeping the night before the flight with the expectations that my Dad was not going to wait for me.  Maybe being in an international airport and airplane.  I arrived to Miami feeling well, but two days later I started having chills and body aches.  At the time, the country did not even have enough kits to test its citizens so I thought it would be pointless to head out to a clinic to try to get tested.  I hunkered down, had mild fever for a couple of days, then the cough.  Because it was before the virus had been identified on the East Coast or in Mexico, I didn’t think it was the Corona virus, so I went with that.  Three weeks later I think I made the right call so my job now during the pandemic is to stay healthy and not become a threat to anyone else.

Now in the middle of the pandemic, my wife and I are amongst the lucky ones that don’t have much to worry about.  Our whole family is heeding the warnings and everyone is at their homes.  One son continues to work but we trust he is following the healthcare guidelines and stays out of trouble.  As long as everyone in the family stays healthy, we will just worry about staying healthy and not put ourselves in unnecessary risks.

Our biggest concern right now is for our tenants.  Many of them are losing their jobs and the commercial tenants have been forced to close their doors.  We are expecting that some of them will not have the funds to continue paying their rents, so even we could be affected negatively by all this.  The domino effect will continue to impact us even if we are not directly affected by the virus.

Other than that, we are always reminded that we are amongst the lucky.  No symptoms, no disease, and lots of entertainment to keep us occupied for a month.  I have several computers, an iPad, a TV and lists of things I want to do but don’t usually have the time to do them.  I also live in an area that does not have the density that would require for me to stay locked up at home.  We can walk early in the morning and see very few people which would be easy to keep at a safe distance.   Many in the world don’t have what we have so I am not complaining about our situation.  We are the lucky ones this time around.

In the meantime, my most important job is to stay healthy!  Stay home, wear safety gear when out and about, minimize the need to go out and about, stay 2 meters away from others, and stay sane. 

Let’s embrace ourselves for what we have ahead.

My Dad's final days

The 26^th of January the Miami family celebrated my father’s 90^th birthday.  It was a few days before his actual birth date of 9-Feb, but my sister was leaving the next Tuesday and I was leaving to Mexico on the 7^th of February.  We didn’t think much of it as our father seemed to be doing well with no health concerns.  We took him to Sergio’s on Coral Way, a Cuban restaurant that was convenient to most.  About 20 people came out, including two of his four grand kids and 2 of his 5 great-grandsons.  There were also a niece and other relatives that have immigrated from Cuba in the last few years.  It was a joyous moment.  We took group photos, we sang the birthday song and had a great meal. 

About two weeks later on Valentine’s day, he complaint of a pain near his groin.  It seemed to be a hernia but to confirm, he was taken to the hospital for an MRI.  The MRI showed the hernia, but it also showed an aneurysm developing in the abdominal aorta (abdominal aortic aneurysm or triple As) which if not treated could burst at any minute.  The phone calls came in, my sister returned and I was already on my way back from Mexico that Monday so I asked to go ahead with what needed to be done and to keep me informed during my return travel.  Upon my arrival in Miami I saw the videos of the family’s discussions with the surgeon where he was suggesting to do a less-invasive procedure, since given his age, the more involved procedure could put him at great risk.  By the time I made it to Mercy Hospital that Monday 17-Feb 2020, the (simpler) procedure was done and my father woke up in good spirits.  A couple of days of observation and he was back home on Thursday the 20^th.

It didn’t last long.  On the 23^th my Dad went back to Mercy Hospital helped by Erick and my mother.  He looked pale and stressed out.  Several studies later, the surgeon and his head doctor were debating how long to wait to give my Dad a better chance to recover before another surgery.  On the 27^th things took a turn for the worse and he seemed to be at the brink of losing the battle.  I was in Mexico again and expedited my return flight as the phone call said, if you want to see your Dad alive, you need to head back right away.  The doctors ordered a couple of pints of blood transfusion and by the time I made it back on Friday the 28^th, he had made a huge improvement.

By that time, the decision was whether to go for the more invasive surgery or wait for him to recover before attempting any additional procedures.  His condition was really too weak to attempt the former so we made arrangements for him to go home and wait it out for a few weeks until he felt stronger.  It turned out that I had been able to visit him at the hospital the Friday that I returned but by Sunday, I was already aware that I was not all well.  The talk at the time was that there was a Corona Virus migrating from Asia to America and it was a deadly virus.  At the time there were no tests to confirm exposure to COVID-19 but because I had been in international flights, and to be overly cautious, I decided to stay home for the next two days with chills and body aches.  I felt better by Wednesday 4-March, but not good enough to visit my Dad at the hospital for fear of contaminating others with whatever this was.  

I finally was able to see him back at home on Friday the 6^th.   My Mother had brought him home under the care of VITAS’ hospice care and under strict DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) rules.  The family was very concerned that unless he pulled a huge improvement, we may be seeing the last of him.

All the last few days at the hospital he had remained lucid and thinking clearly, however he had spent about 20-22 hours of his days sleeping.  I know he recognized all of us and we were able to communicate a few words here and there.  He had been hard of hearing in the last few years, so our communications had been limited and brief.  

On Saturday the 7^th, we spent the whole day with him but as it started to get dark, I thought that I should not be out and about so B and I headed home.  About 30 minutes later, as I was about to enter the elevator at home, my sister called that our Dad had taken his last breath.  I went back immediately to be with them and to do what I could as the funeral home took his body just short of midnight.  Funeral arrangements and the actual burial happened in the next few days, with concerns of keeping the groups to a minimum and learning the notion of 'social distancing' as the world fought the COVID-19 virus.

He accompanied me in this life for almost 63 years.  He was a decent man.  A loving father.  And passed away at his home surrounded by loved ones.  Like my son Erick said at his memorial, “My grandfather died like a king.  At his home, under the complete care of his wife of 64 years of marriage and surrounded by his children and grandchildren”.  I have to agree with him, we would be ungrateful if we complaint on how he died.

Now to face my remaining life without his presence and constant expressions of love.  He will be missed.