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  2020-12-02

  Sonja Carlson - MY COVID STORY

  This is a short COVID-19 reflection on the experience of Sonja Carlson, a semi-retired craft guru. The story is written as a Word Doc.
• 2020-11-25

  Pandemic Poetry, Poem: Untitled

  "1816 has been described as "The Year Without a Summer." For me, 2020 has been like "The Year Without a Year." It has been like being in "Limbo," a year of Purgatory, the "Trump Bardo" - that intermediate state where you weather a s**t-storm of hypocrisy, lies, and disease before passing on to the next level of existence. How do I weather it? With humor, a lyrical outlook, exercise, perseverance, and family." -Dan Nave
• 2020-11-25

  Working and Living in a Pandemic

  I think one of biggest impacts of COVID for me has been wondering if, or when, someone close to me will contract the virus. A fear that at times can be intense or foreboding, and at other times, that fades into feeling ‘normal.’ It was several months into the pandemic before I knew of anyone who knew someone that was ill. More recently a couple of family members had very serious cases of the illness, and a couple more that tested positive but had no symptoms. Being vigilant, following safety procedures such as masks and hand sanitizer have finally become normal as well. Early days I found myself nearly obsessed with reading the news, watching the daily press conferences, and looking up the statistics. These activities have reduced to a daily glance or two to look at numbers or read the latest about the vaccination. I worry about my family. I wonder sometimes if I feel even slightly ill or off if ‘this is it’— have I finally contracted it? And then worry about giving it to others. Another way that I have felt the impact has been in the work environment. I work remotely in the technical sector, and have for several years, so at the beginning of the pandemic there were no adjustments in my routine. However, it didn’t take long to see the impacts of the virus on my clients. Impacts that were not prepared for even with disaster recovery, risk management or continuity planning. The financial impacts businesses affected their ability to ensure employees could work from home. That their employees would have the correct equipment, connectivity, could adapt to the necessary behavioral changes that can disrupt productivity, etc. How now can we receive, prepare and ship equipment, when no one can be in an office to receive anything? The changes have especially impacted efforts to bring on new employees. One thing that I found striking was the requirements in security and access to data when moving from a secure network environment, to set up for the same security at home. A majority of my teams live in countries outside of the United States where some don’t have internet in their homes, let alone being set up to manage Personal Private Information (PPI). My clients in financial sectors have stringent background checks that can take several weeks to clear in the “old world” under normal conditions. With agencies closed and workforce reduced, it is taking two to three times longer to get simple things accomplished. The last major impact I have felt during the shift to my sector becoming a “working from home one,” was experiencing people on the other end of ZOOM, as we all had to overcome our fears about interruptions. Children crying, wanting attention because they don’t understand why mom and dad are home but can’t pay attention to them. Dogs barking, doorbells ringing, calls dropping. It took several months to work out many of the kinks, and for everyone to adjust to these interruptions, but being OK with them. Overall, I would say that I am not directly impacted too much for the moment. Most of the adjustments that have been made and are now normal feeling. Things are finally feeling like they are back to business as usual, I suppose. On a personal level, my fears rise and wain, and each day is different. I am leery of vaccinations, and wonder if the “wonder cure” we’ve been promised will be miraculous, or if more difficulties will follow? The verdict is not out on that yet, so we will have to wait and see what our next ”new normal” will really look like.
• 2020-11-23

  Pandemic Poetry, Poem Titled: "Trumpty Dumpty"

  "Trumpty Dumpty built a great wall. Trumpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the Deplorables and Proud Little Men Couldn't elect Trumpty as President again..." This was a poem written by Dan Nave, who has used poetry as a means of processing his thoughts and feelings during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
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  2020-11-23

  High Risk Populations - The Story of David Nelson M. II

  “This email is in regard to my grandfather's Covid diagnosis: My grandfather's name is David Nelson M. II. He was born June 1, 1936, so that means he's 84. It also means he is in the high-risk group. In January of this year [2020], he went on a cruise with a group of his friends and returned feeling ill. At first he wrote his illness off as the flu, but his "flu" lasted for months. Eventually, went to a clinic and discovered he had COVID-19, so his doctor ordered him to go to the emergency room on November 3rd. He was in the emergency room for five hours before the staff finally admitted him, spending the next seven days in the hospital. After a five-course treatment on IV, he was released and allowed to go home on November 10th.” The contributor of this story also reported that within two weeks following his grandfather's release from the hospital, his grandfather had a serious fall. Whether or not this fall can be contributed to any prolonged side effects of the virus has not yet been determined. There have been, however, documented cases of people experiencing cognitive fatigue, such as dizziness and, and other side effects related to cognition and the nervous system weeks and even months following their recovery form COVID-19. This is a phenomena warranting further research to determine what the possible long-lasting effects may be to people who have survived the illness, especially those at high risk such as the elderly and those suffering from a chronic disease.