Another week of nice weather here in southern Oklahoma. Flowers are in bloom and the birds are all singing. Admiring nature is a good way to take a break from everything that is going on in the world. Eventually though you have to go back and pick up your responsibilities. I’m not talking about myself because without children or grandchildren to worry about, I don’t have to concern myself with all the details and tasks that are a constant for other folks. I can only admire young parents raising children and working jobs that must be important sine they are still going to work during this lock down.
It’s easy to tale a dim view of humanity if all you read and see are news reports about crime and mayhem. If you go looking you can find the stories about people helping their neighbors and in some cases strangers. This week I watched a story about a woman handing out food to truck drivers that at times have had trouble finding food while they were on the road because of all of the restaurant closings, a restaurant owner keeping many of his employees working, cooking meals for anyone that needs them, another man that owns rental property, several of them house restaurants. He waved the lease payment if the business owners agreed to use the money to pay their employees.
Some of the feel good stories are about people that take time out of their day to be kind to someone that needs a pick me up. A teenage girl after having finished her last cancer treatment, is welcomed home by the neighbors lining the street. All of them keeping their distances but they are applauding and cheering and waving their homemade signs, a t.v. actor getting some of his friends to help and using something called Zoom (I’m told that is some more of this social media that old folks like me don’t understand) was able to host a high school prom for a bunch of kids scattered across the country, all in their homes.
One story that caught my attention, more for it’s quirkiness than anything else, was about all the people that had not gotten dressed up and gone out since this all started, did just that and got dressed in their fine formal wear and took the trash receptacle to the curb for pick up day.
That story makes me think about a job that most people don’t want, trash collector. How bad would this lock down be if they were not on the job.
All the time I have on my hands has enabled me to discover that I enjoy watching You Tube videos of people using a band saw mill to make lumber out of trees. I also enjoy watching people make wooden bowls using axes, adzes and chisels. Just in case you think that I am wasting my time, I have also been watching videos about gardening, pruning and grafting trees, starting plants from cuttings and making flower pots and planters out of cement. Just yesterday I watched a video about the ten ways you can tell that your spouse is cheating, on second thought I probably don’t have much use for that information.
All things considered, I guess social media is good for something. Education and staying in touch with far flung family. Now if you don’t mind I am going to listen to Mads Tolling play The Ashokan Farewell on the violin.
Be kind to one another, you never known what they are going through.
