Pandemic: The Upside

Since she last posted bemoaning her status as an essential worker, House Crazy Sarah has been transitioned to working from home. This has been a huge blessing. She is still working and earning a paycheck, but all from the safety and comfort of her little old house.

There’s something about living in an old house during times like these that is inherently comforting. When you spend time in an old house which has been through pandemics and world wars and depressions and recessions, you realize: we will endure. This is perhaps why House Crazy Sarah likes old things so much: they give hope and reassurance that life will go on.

The other day on Facebook, House Crazy Sarah came across this gnarly 392 year-old guy…

He’s a Greenland Shark born in the year 1627! (Scientists can tell his age by carbon dating proteins in his eyes – which apparently doesn’t hurt the animal). He’s been around for almost 4 centuries peoples! And look how dumb and happy he looks! A little long in the tooth, but he’s still on this earth, after so much history has gone by. The moral of Mr. Shark’ story, stay calm and carry on.

House Crazy Sarah likes to look on the bright side…

For an introvert, social isolation, social distancing, quarantining – whatever you want to call it – is a relief! Being home all day in our private houses, away from all the peoples, in the quiet of our thoughts, is a great restorative time for us introverts.

Sure House Crazy Sarah feels deeply for all of the other front line workers who have to keep working in risky COVID conditions – her own little sissy is an essential healthcare worker in a hospital up in Canada. 🙁

House Crazy Sarah’s sissy at work

But for those of us who like being alone in our houses, we can really see the upside of being under order to stay at home.

For example, we get to go whole days (or two, or three) in our jammies. House Crazy Sarah has not worn a bra in a week! Freedom! We get to snuggle with our puppies – and how they are loving having their peoples at home!

One of House Crazy Sarah’s happy rescue puppies

We get to spend time with our kidlets! House Crazy Sarah misses them when she is at work and they are at school (yes little hooligans – she actually misses you!).

We get to watch the springs flowers pop up around the yard – something we are usually too busy to even notice.

Sure there’s lots of sadness and terrible fortunes befalling folks right now, but let’s not lose our shit over this coronavirus thing. Let’s look for the beauty around us, whatever that may be.

House Crazy Sarah is a student of history. She loves studying the olden days to see what we can learn from them. Lately she has been reading and watching shows about the Second World War in particular. The more she learns of that time, and the grit and resiliency of the old ones, the more she feels confident that we will get through these current hardships and come back better than ever.

The governor of her state (Colorado) is calling the month of April 2020 “the Lost Month”. But House Crazy Sarah disagrees. She sees this as a found month. We are finding ourselves either out there on the front lines, fighting the good fight – learning our mettle, or safe in our homes, having the time to finally slow down and be still with our thoughts.

And there is one other huge upside to this global shut-in that House Crazy Sarah would like to point out: there have been no mass shootings since the coronavirus began to keep us home. This is a grim thing to point out, but hallelujah! No (or very few) lives lost to bullets during the time of coronavirus.

Not to mention that the planet is loving our noticeable human slow-down of transport and industry. With everyone on lock-down, nature is getting a much needed chance to recover from humans. Wildlife is finally returning to its natural habitat. Just look at Inverness, Scotland. It’s Nessy!

#The Earth is healing. #We are the virus.

Yes bad times abound right now – all over the world, but House Crazy Sarah is challenging you to look on the brighter side because there is already enough sadness in the world.

When times are tough, House Crazy always wonders: what would John Denver say?

Well here’s one thing he said:

“Home grown tomatoes, home grown tomatoes

What would life be like without homegrown tomatoes?

Only two things that money can’t buy

That’s true love and home grown tomatoes.”