Today I arranged flowers and made a v et y satisfying salad. I went from depressed yesterday to optimistic today.

All it took was spending a little money on flowers and using the resources in the house. Now I’m tired.

It is Salad Season. I know. There is no specific Salad Season. But I bought a Bag O’ Salad for 99 cents yesterday. The store had this pear & gorgonzola salad “kit” that they were touting. I read the contents. I had everything I needed to fix this, including gorgonzola cheese crumbles. So I made my version. I had cold asparagus spears, hearts of palm, Roma tomatoes, along with the pear. It is a marvelous blend of flavors. J liked it. I served it with grilled salmon with lemon, dill, and tarragon. The salad was a perfect complement to the fish.

On the COVID-19 front, #1 Son is recovering , but he is still tired. His joint pain has moved to his knees and below. The virus is some serious stuff. If you had told me on January 1 that my son and a very close friend would both have this disease, I would not have believed you. Or that there would be four fatalities in a nursing home, just a kilometer from our house, I would have been equally incredulous.

So it was a good day. Hope your days were good too.

Yesterday, because I love flowers, and the garden has no more blooms, I spent $12 for some cut flowers at Publix. Best $12 I’ve spent in a long time.

Here at 22:22 Eastern Zone, North America , I am tired, have a load of laundry in the wash. I have walked 4 miles, prepared a tacos meal.

The walk gives that slow dreamy feeling. I need my post workout shower, clean clothes. Maybe I will shave. I do want to have another cup of decaffeinated coffee.

I lost a couple of pounds this week. I am under 200 lbs again (198.4 lbs, 14.14 stone, 89.99 KG.).I keep track of what I eat, eat lean protein, fruits and vegetables for the most part.

Bedtime. Almost.

It is 03:40 Eastern North America. I went to bed early, awoke early. I resolved to throw away some accumulated rubbish. But first I need to post. J is on paid quarantine leave. She is a little disoriented, wondering what having days and days of unstructured time is like.

I’m hoping for a relationship/intimacy reset. Maybe we could have one of those close relationships where we do stuff together. I’m beginning to feel tears well up, not that I will cry. I read stories where partners do things, but we operate in separate orbits.

Time to drink the coffee I made, starting tossing the trash out. More later.

04:40 AM. I did throw some stuff out. I feel lonely and lost again. I’m worried about #1 Son. He should get through this virus OK. Still I can’t help but worry. He tends to minimize his illnesses. Not that he has that many.

I just feel as if there is nothing to look forward to.

I just heard from #1 Son , age 43. He and, in all likelihood, his wife, have COVID-19. This virus is now spreading through Central Virginia.

Today is The Annuciation. This is the day the Archangel Gabriel appeared to The Blessed Virgin Mary to tell her she would conceive and bear a son, who would be The Messiah. All that was required was her assent. And her answer was, “Let it be done according to thy word.”

I know my readers are everywhere along the faith, spirituality, religion spectrum. But today is about hope. And deliverance. It has only been 90 days since Christmas. But the hope and excitement and love that I felt then is returning at a time when I need, we need to hear and experience the message.  Even in dark times, we are not alone.

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In The Church, the Marian Feasts track almost independently from the other Feasts and Solemnities. As my faith has grown since I became Catholic ten years ago, my trust and devotion to The Blessed Mother has deepened. I am not at all reticent to call her my Protectress.

There are several long-term care and assisted living  facilities in my neighbourhood. One of the facilities had two COVID-19 fatalities in recent days. I have no contact with the facility in question. Still, the losses are hitting closer to home now.

Wait, there’s more. Turns out my friend E, the single mom who struggles to put food on the table and a roof over het head, had COVID-19. She thought it was the flu. She got through it. Thank God.

We don’t think in terms of abundance. There is plenty. My refrigerator is full. My freezer is full. My pantry is full. And yet, I have thus nagging fear that I don’t have enough, whatever that means. I don’t need to go anywhere to get anything. There are businesses that will deliver, should I run out of anything.

Now this pandemic could last longer than what the epidemiologists estimate. We don’t need to face that for quite a while.

I’ve always been aware that our fear of running out drives a good deal of the economy. The Toilet Paper Phenomenon bears witness to this. The Seinfeld episode The Stall comes to mind. ” I don’t have a square to spare.”

Fear of scarcity and viewing our neighbors as threats seem to dominate our thinking. Now we shouldn’t be naïve, but don’t have to be cynical either. But we fluctuate from one polarity to the other, without spending a whole lot of time in the middle ground.

Well I felt really tired after my post-walk shower. I must admit it was an enormously satisfying shower. I went up and lay beside J. The next thing I knew I was asleep. I was so sleepy at that moment, I didn’t even care that she had a Hallmark Channel movie on the telly.

But I awoke. I checked on some slow cooker chicken soup I had going. On impulse, I added potatoes, mushrooms, an onion and garlic to the soup, deciding against the chicken with egg noodle I had planned originally. The potatoes felt a little less firm than I like and decided to peel and add them to the soup, rather than let them get any more “sketchy”, as #2 son would say.

Now I’m blissfully blogging. Looks like J and I might be entering a phase of more togetherness soon. However, she is debating whether to take paid quarantine leave or not. J has no basis to think COVID-19. won’t hit her, as if our house is divinely protected in some modern take on Passover.

It is ironic that we all think someone else could be taken ill and then succumb to this virus. But the virus doesn’t care. The virus just wants to replicate on a host animal. That animal could easily be you or I.

But obsessing about this little mofo is pointless. I just hope the soup turns out well.