We gave Covid 19 the keys to our house 248 days ago, how are things going?
May 16, 2021
We gave Covid 19 the keys to our house 262 days ago, how are things going?
May 30, 2021
It is 08.00 am on Friday 14 May 2021, two hundred and fifty-five days from the start of the 2020 – 2021 school year.
Week Two into our ‘new horizons’ programme
Last week, we were bemoaning the fact that Mum would need to wait (goodness knows how long?) till the eligible age for vaccination was lowered. And guess what, this week she has become eligible! And guess what again – she already has an appointment in four days time for her first Pfizer jab. And guess what again, the vaccination centre is only a ten-minute walk from ‘chez nous’, not a fifty kilometers drive to another region with a big football stadium.
We still don’t believe it! President Macron must be reading our blog! Who knows, maybe he’s started scanning everybody’s blogs to get new ideas to make himself look more competent to his citizens. Anyway, what a magnificently quick response from the ‘men-in-charge’ for a change and a really encouraging start to our ‘new horizons’ programme! Wow, we are on the first rung of the ladder!
More about the Rumsfeld knowns and unknowns of the SARS-CoV2 saga
The Donald Rumsfeld quote was presumably designed to make people think out of the box and not assume that they are clever and know everything. There are tons of stuff we have no awareness of at all. Shit happens! In Mum and Dad’s view, Donald has at last found his real niche with the SARS-CoV2 saga. So many ‘know-it-alls’ have crawled out from under every stone, posing, pontificating and posturing – here, there and everywhere and all the time.
Some of which led to much more shit happening. From time to time, really nasty shit happened and continues to happen. This applies 200% + to the SARS-CoV2. Its success is due to the dedicated support the virus has received from all the denialists, the money-obsessed capitalists, the outrageous opportunists and from all the airlines, desperate to keep flying come what may. Most of the unfolding saga falls into the ‘known knowns’ and the ‘known unknowns’ categories. We have learnt over the past year, through our hermit living and extreme anti-social behaviour, how to safely tolerate what we absolutely know and what we are not so sure of (the mix of not having full and accurate information and the deliberately disruptive, even poisonous misinformation).
The ‘unknown unknowns’ is an entirely different kettle of fish. Each unknown unknown is by definition a complete primary mystery. Each unknown unknown also carries an unknown level of risk to us, another complete mystery on top of the primary mystery. An unknown unknown may be beneficial, or dangerous or may have no impact at all one way or another. Perhaps it’s waiting to bless us with good health or riches or perhaps not, perhaps it’s going to pounce upon us at a moment’s notice, severing our physical and mental wellbeing better than a guillotine, or perhaps not, perhaps it’s going to do nothing to us, or perhaps not. Perhaps, perhaps.
Following upon our declaration in last week’s blog that ‘Our mission puts fair and square in the worst category, the unknown unknowns!’ this week we tried to make a practical list of the unknown unknowns that are troubling us the most so that we could focus on them and contain our concerns, What a totally naïve approach! All we showed is that we were thinking straight! We found out the hard way that you can’t ACTUALLY make a list of your unknown unknowns, since you don’t know what you don’t know. All our real worries come from the cess pit of the known unknowns.
We need to work harder to protect our physical and mental health Mum and Dad arrived independently at the same conclusion last week when we stopped for a moment to catch up on things – we’re super-stressed just now. Not surprising really when we are trying to build a more satisfying, more enjoyable life at the same time as heading into next week – the week when everybody will go crazy again, released from the latest lockdown. Unfortunately, there are no easy stepping stones to cross what feels like a huge fast flowing river torrent between the end of our first year with Covid and the start of the second year. Can we really carry out risk assessments properly? Can we really make it work? Can we really get to the other side of the river? We just don’t know but we have upped our stress management and manged to take our first baby steps towards our ‘new horizons’.
By John Saunders
World Health Communication Associates (WHCA) & INSPIRIT Creatives UG NGO,
MediaWise and MediaFocusUK
Strengthening connections
while keeping distance
News You Can Use
We are all vulnerable to this virus. This is a unique time for our communities all over the world as we work to combat this massive global threat. This blog aims to collect and share your stories and reflections that can help others to cope, thrive and build resilience…
Our communities are at different stages of response in different parts of the world. We can learn a lot from each other. Building on World Health Organization and other evidence-based guidance, this blog will gather and disseminate stories that inform, inspire and hopefully strengthen social connectiveness while we all practice physical distancing.
We invite you to contribute. At present we are looking for stories in the following areas:
May the force be with all of us.
Sabrina, Mike, Steve, Tuuli and Franklin for the Connecting Communities team
BLOG: https://www.inspiritcreatives.com/coronavirus-connecting-communities
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While we grieve for the tremendous loss of lives in so many countries, we can see and feel that the need to connect communities and share learning grows everyday. Please attach your comments and stories to this blog or send them to cccov19@gmail.com or attach them to this blog. We welcome stories in all languages and from all countries. Here are some first examples of stories and links. Send us yours and make this blog useful.