I just used ten percent of my French vocabulary in the above title. Let’s see how much of the remainder I can drop in this story, which is about liberte, fraternite and anomie. One early May,1977 afternoon, I waited for a way-behind-schedule Amtrak train to take me home from college.
Very well said, and mirrors much of what I've thought and felt over the past two years. I am one of the people who live alone, and since I don't speak French, recently the words "bored" and "lonely" have been flitting around in my head. I always feel like I can't complain, because I'm still employed, my employer does not require the jab (though I am the sole holdout). I used to go to an office every day in a City. Now I work remotely, most of the time, because of office policy. The few people who have returned to a hybrid mode keep their masks on and office doors closed. It's not the same, friendly and collaborative environment it once was. I never before realized how much I need that sort of normal, human interaction.
I know my neighborhood sooooooo well right now, from all of the walks. I am aware that my mental health is not what it used to be, and that what I need is to be around other people who are mentally healthy (i.e., not masked or fearful or believing the narrative). I am the only person I know in real life who is not jabbed and who does not believe the narrative. My entire extended family is jabbed, as are all of my friends. I don't have the other person at home to talk to, or to look at. Wanting to see another, unmasked face in real life as opposed to virtually. It's been brutal, and I talk myself into passable mental health on a daily, sometimes hourly basis.
What I need is hope for a better future. If I am honest, I don't have that right now. I know that is bleak and not good mental health, so I try to manufacture what I believe that would feel like..... because for most of my life I've had it, I can conjure up a reasonable facsimile. It gets me through. But this is a painful and diminished existence. I'm fully aware that in other places in the U.S., people are fairly normal, and I'd feel great living in one of those other places, and moving is not an option for me right now. Travelling (vacation) is also not an option, due to financial constraints.
Since you wondered..... one person (who live's alone)'s experience.
I have to believe there were enough people who knew exactly what they were doing; they can't have ALL (certainly many) been so divorced from the normal rhythms of human life to imagine that this wouldn't devastate us.
There was absolute willful cruelty at work. Maybe even a certain sadistic pleasure at the ability to wield that kind of power. Which is why I still hate them and want them to suffer before their ends.
Yes, absolutely. Now when they are openly reporting that vitamin D levels, exercise and obesity all play a huge role in covid outcomes, to me it's even more obvious that they knew this and wanted us all more susceptible to covid.
You would think these governors would come out and say "I'm so sorry, we just didn't have enough information at the time," but no, nothing. Which tells me they knew all along.
Even tho “cases” are exploding everywhere, the worst of the governors (including mine) claim they were able to reopen & drop mandates because their totalitarian edicts & mass vax’s made it possible! And now the despicable troll, Faux-Xi is throwing trial balloons about being “flexible” in bringing all of that s#¡+ back! My guess is right before the midterms….
Why would governors in NY, NJ, Mass. etc. admit that they made mistakes ? That wouldn’t fit with the narrative.
Very insightful piece by Mr. Oshinskie .... thankfully the Covid-19 hysteria is finally receding, but many Covidians are still afraid to venture outside without a mask on.... the “new normal” in 2022.
Laurie, your comment got me to thinking. Would a newspaper, lets say the NYT or WAPO allow a full page ad which just stated...." Its obvious, what was conspiracy is now fact"? Would that statement draw censorship?
I have known some high level intelligence officials. They are incompetent. Never think things through. The only thing they are good at is shifting blame.
Well- they certainly have *acted* as if there would be no downside. And yet it seems to me that evidence is accumulating that - in fact - our downside is exactly the designed and built upside for the powers which seek to profit from any and all human energy, from every human's cradle-to-grave span.
Destruction of the social fabric was the plan, so that in our isolation we all become ever more dependent on random acts of false benevolence from our jailers. Your story of being maskless at church is one more example of how thorough is this effort.
What you do here is an essential antidote. What I do by me is keep the doors open on a small family biz, a place of maskless faces where a smile and a conversation is always on offer to anyone who steps inside. Casual contact and common physical experience- such that it is, in its small zip code. So many days this feels like building a sand castle as the tide rolls in - but as I think to Camus and Sartre - whatever else is there?
Your story is heartbreaking. I am so very sad for you. I know hubbs and I have also suffered mentally from this. I was forced to get the first two jabs (no more, never) in order for me to care for my father at his fancy neighborhood.
I have developed a thyroid disorder and several other medical problems. No one can fully attribute it to the vaxx but I have been reading and searching.
I am grateful that you shared your misery. You are certainly not "alone"
we are fortunate to have internet where we can find like minded intelligence to engage ourselves and feel stronger.
Mar 23, 2022·edited Mar 23, 2022Liked by Mark Oshinskie
Thanks for sharing, Dani. I've wondered how I would be faring had my circumstances been what yours are. The truth is, I live in one of those other places where life remained relatively 'normal'. When you have a bar or a church on every corner and often a bar right next door to a church, well, we're a breed of folks who fly American Flags from nearly every house on the street and cherish personal freedom and privacy above all else. Sounds redneck - I'll own that. But there were many in my area who complied with masks, jabs, and closings. And that hurt my heart because living in fear is no life at all. But neither is living in solidarity feeling lonely with no options to escape the reality of your situation. Fight back, Dani, find a way, forge a new path, conjure the existence you want by taking solid steps outside your comfort zone. Walking is nice, it's something I enjoy doing, but… I related to how Mark feels walking alone, doing so too often causes a strange kind of lonely feeling to bubble up. If you find that something to tap into, I hope you'll update us. I could be you if I lived where you are, so I'll be thinking of you positively and lovingly and throwing vibes of strength and wellbeing in your direction.
"redneck" - in my opinion - is a misused term. most "rednecks" I know are really just salt of the earth types, a bit rough around the edges, but are the folks I want around me if the poop hits the fan. my town sounds a lot like yours. and i am grateful for that.
Mar 23, 2022·edited Mar 23, 2022Liked by Mark Oshinskie
Your point about being the only person you know.... I have now found two people at my employer who are in my same state - countdown to termination due to the unvaxxed state. While I had my people not jabbed (immediate family, parents, one professional in my field with whom I work closely) that have given me support throughout this, finding the two people going through the same experience has been a lifeline. I knew both of them, but we didn't know our shared state. I have been vocal (under my real identity) about freedom and inclusion on LinkedIn but not my thoughts on vaccines, due to fear of cancellation. But I've spoken out enough that these two people decided to reach out. It is a lifeline. Second connection actually made this week. The real life people are there, and I hope you find them. Until then, Dani, your online community wants to provide support. Thank you for sharing your story.
I am so sorry. I can't imagine what it would have been like to go through this alone. I really pray that you can move somewhere "normal." I was so fortunate to be able to take my two sons to Texas last spring and the first time we sat in a restaurant brimming with people (California still had no inside dining then) I cried. To be able to live like humans again for six weeks did so much for our mental health.
I don't know what your beliefs are but most people in my church are not jabbed, we never wore masks in church when we opened up against the mandates and we are pretty much like minded on the topic. I know all churches aren't like this.
I also found a like-minded community at my church. We never had a sign on our doors proclaiming adherence to petty government tyranny. People were always welcome to mask or not mask as they saw fit. And the vast majority chose not to mask the entire time. It makes SUCH a difference to have at least one place/facet in your life where you can relax and feel supported and not be in defense-mode.
Nearly every sentence you wrote struck that "bell". I too have kept a very close watch on my mental state, well aware of what was gradually happening. I too took daily walks, forced myself out, though with the "crossing the street rather than pass me on the same side walk" was a constant occurrence; but also the looks in the eyes (since the masks covered all else) of those near our community mail station which contains a pigeon hole box for every resident. My approach to this outdoor facility, without a mask, caused a look of "sheer terror" in the eyes of many I did not actually know by name, but here to fore had always chatted and joked with previous to Covid. Now, they backed away as I approached my box to get my mail, and by "backed away", I mean very visibly removing themselves far more than 6' from me. With their masks AND face shields of clear plastic, attached to a kind of headband, and sticking out a good 5-6 inches all the way around the face (I assume to give the virus microbes a clear path in ? ). They would usually have already put on their gloves. People brought all types to the mail station: white cotton "church" type, bicycling and weight lifting, knitted winter gloves, "dressy" leather, etc. etc. Seems people just brought whatever was on hand in a drawer or shelf, even gardening gloves. Some had fancy packets of disposable gloves, like some folks keep in the car to keep the smell of gasoline off their hands when filling up. All this only served to make me "second guess" myself, to worry if it was really I whose mental health was deteriorating ? I too live alone, have retired, and have always been engaged in a very wide range of leisure and travel activities, physical sports, and social engagements. This has been a challenge. Simple things like playing golf at the neighborhood course changed drastically, no longer were people more than happy to welcome someone to make a foursome. It took a very deliberate effort entirely on my part, to find ways to interact with other people. I got on a list to purchase a bicycle and finally got one, nothing fancy, not a mountain bike, just a plain old bicycle, larger tires, and I had to build up leg strength to peddle for long rides, but it was worth it. It IS a painful and diminished existence as you described. I realize financial constraints are a tough challenge, but if at all possible, try to make a long range plan to move to a less restrictive area than your present home, it is so worth it for both your mental and physical health. Just making such a plan can engage the mind and lead you to contact people in other areas even if the engagement is only via internet, text, and phone. Working on such a project can really help. We all need those kinds of big projects that hold promise of a big pay off in the future. I happen to live in an area where such strict isolating regulations were very short lived. Within just a few weeks, our local and state government realized the effect this could have on both the physical and mental health of residents, and decided the best plan was to urge people to get out to the state parks, beaches, walking and riding trails, any kind of outdoor exercise according to ability. Get in shape, loose weight, exercise daily, and eat a healthy diet became the official message for the state !
I’m so sorry to hear this. I don’t know your circumstances or if you could or even wish to make a change, but there are places where not everyone is vaxxed or masked. You have my sympathy. It’s difficult to live happily that way.
This piece has given me an unanticipated new angle on my grief over all we've lost as a human society. Your writing is clear, yet gentle, as it maps this long unfolding of the emptiness that's both outside in the neighborhoods and inside so many hearts. Your gentle touch - like a warm hand on a shoulder at the right moment- is what released this layer of grief for me. For months and months I've mostly kept a semblance of functionality by being angry more often than sad. But that won't work in the long haul for any of us hoping to maintain real connection with any other humans...
Excellent article. I can attest to the over-exposure to family. I'm a sandwich generation. I have both my 18 yo kids and my late 70s parents in the same household. Which while I was working in NYC with young twins was a fabulous arrangement. Once the kids started driving became less necessary and moreso since I now work from home. I really don't get out much at all since the office closed, partially reopened and then went vax required. Masks where required, like you I refuse to wear one. Now they've permanently closed the office and sublet the office space. I'm kind of tired of seeing the same faces day in and day out. Love my parents but I've had way to much together time with them, even more-so since they've bought into the scamdemic narrative. At least they aren't giving me too hard a time about declining the vax for myself and the very healthy twins.
When the lockdown started, I was 8 months into a grief journey having lost the love of my life very suddenly the previous July. It was devastating. I had made baby steps along the path, been in counseling for a couple of month, found a new job, and could get through the better part of the day without dissolving into a puddle of tears. I was actually looking forward to being in an office regularly for the first time in 8 months (btw lost my job 10 days after i lost my love). And then came the lockdown and the isolation, the fear, the outright crazy. It set me back to the beginning on the path.
I still fight with the notion that we've sacrificed the present for a future that isn't guaranteed. Tomorrow is never definite. Hell, the next hour is never guaranteed. I learned that the hard way in July 2019. at 2:15pm I got a text that he wasn't feeling well and called an ambulance. At 4:35, at little over two hours later, he was gone. We need to stop fearing the unknown. When did we go from being the enthusiastic, risk seeking bold young country to being afraid of any risk? This is no way to live. While I'm not advocating for living reckless like every minute could be your last, why bother saving money or eating right for there's no tomorrow. I'm not that nihilistic. But what we've done, or more precisely have had done to us, over the last two years is insane. Finding others of like mind in the last year has been extremely helpful, along with meditation and journaling that I'm a functional human again who's looking to live and not just survive.
I started volunteering at the sign in desk of a local homeless shelter when I thought they wouldn't be assholes about masking. Getting to know the men there makes me thankful for them. We're all fragile in our ways; these guys know it better than I do. They take a day at a time. It makes me so glad for all the people in my life, even those I don't like. Life is short whether we get killed by a virus or not. Each day is a gift. I don't ever take anyone for granted.
Thank you for your reply. Taking life a day at a time and nothing for granted is how we should be living! I'm moving out of my horribly blue area for a free state in a few months and will be looking for opportunities to volunteer like you do.
I spent from 9 to 17 in Ramsey, NJ in the late 60s early 70s and can't imagine that town squashed by covid. It was a fantastic place to grow up. We left for the Adirondacks when taxes started being confiscatory, 1971. We live on the eastern shore of Maryland now and it's at least balanced. People are hereditary Dems but think and act conservative.
I'm a born and raised (still live here) Fair Lawnite. Used to work up Ramsey way for a lawyer. This was a great area to grow up and I've gotten my kids to 18 here. But the last two years have turned me from never consider leaving the area to buying a house under construction in S.C. I spent almost 3 years working in Montgomery Co MD and found it was by far not conservative so MD and VA were quickly kicked out of my list of possible destinations. I really wanted a reliably red state. While ideally I want to go to FL because DeSantis is AWESOME, the kids vetoed that. I have hopes Ron will be pres :)
Mar 24, 2022·edited Mar 24, 2022Liked by Mark Oshinskie
Montgomery County, in fact, most of the Western Shore counties of Maryland are pretty left leaning. The flood of DC people to those counties has made them awful. The counties east of Chesapeake Bay are way more conservative and laissez faire. Still saddled with the same RINO governor but we've had much worse. Our two Dem senators utterly worthless. Our Congressional rep is a pretty decent Republican. We have a lot of refugees here from West of the Bay, Pennsylvania and NJ.
I'm sorry you will be pressured into leaving Fair Lawn after growing up there and raising kids. Florida's climate doesn't agree with me but it's got some very sweet spots. Hard to know where to flee. I will say Savannah Georgia is a favorite city. People laid back and so different from the nosey Nellies of Metro DC Baltimore. If I had to leave MD now it'd either be Arizona near Phoenix, dust bowl that it is, or Savannah.
Mar 23, 2022·edited Mar 23, 2022Liked by Mark Oshinskie
The Scamdemic enlightened me. I realized the precarious situation I was in and that the Demoncrats were out to destroy all of our lives. It's true, it came true, and the deniers are suffering. I am no longer suffering. The lockdowns propelled me to get off my butt (which gained 20 lbs during 2020) and move out of my birthplace, Commifornia, for good. I have had my business in Texas since 2010 so off I went to the fly-over state. Voila! No masks . . . or not enough to bother an anti-masker like me. My friends are living normal lives and having fun, social gatherings, etc. I felt like I went through a time-warp . . . it's like Covid never happened in Texas. I'm selling my ranch in Commifornia as we speak. I will never return to that Hellhole - never. I now hate Demoncrats and Libtards when I used to just despise them for their ignorance. If intolerance is a symptom of being subjected to two years of Coronalies, I confess I have a severe case. The fact that our lives were destroyed by politicians with single-digit IQs baffles me. I've lost faith in half of America for their willingness to fall in line and drink the Kool-Aid! Other than that, I'm grateful that I have found peace and a safe place - at least for now.
Wonderfully written and thank you. Change the details and scenery and many of us share the same melancholy about what society and life has become. While it’s more normal here, my family is unvaccinated and so my husband hasn’t been “invited” back to his office, they are saying maybe June. Target looks like a subsidiary of the Taliban. People are socially distancing in their cars at stop lights. Kids have gone from a beacon of joy and determination to blah just getting through each day, particularly those trapped in public schools that were home so long and only very recently released from pointless dehumanizing masks.
As a mom what makes me so melancholy is for my kids. We’ve traveled, they’ve been in private school where mask exemptions amount to a “my kid isn’t wearing one” note from parents, they have gone to activities. Excepting school, other children are missing. When we travel it’s mostly adults, even to places like a family resort in Jamaica we visit often most recently a few months ago. We go out to eat during weekend hops to the mountains and they wonder why they see grandparents and not families. At the beach, hiking, lakes, everything except going to FL - adults everywhere and half attendance at specifically kid oriented stuff.
My kids are 8 and 10. They were sent home from school, one they never returned to and never got to say goodbye to, just before the youngest turned 6, and the oldest was 8. Today they are having a hard time hanging onto memories of what normal life even was. I can’t help but tear up just thinking about it.
I ask them ever couple weeks if they remember a long trip to southern CA and Jamaica in 2019? Do they remember normal happy faces? Do they remember strangers smiling at them and talking to them out and about? The older one says she has to think really hard to remember and it’s getting harder. The younger says his mind is playing tricks on him. He knows nobody was wearing a mask, but his brain can’t make sense of that. He says his memories are with no masks but his brain wants to put masks on people and it makes him really sad to think about it because he doesn’t know if he can really remember. 💔💔💔
The hardest part is that they have been as shielded as any children in NC. By May 2020 they were going to outdoor day camp for children of “essential” workers a few days a week. No masks. We were on the beaches of Hilton Head when BLM riots and curfews broke out at home. We’ve gone to free places as much as we can. They got to go to school in person the whole time from mid August 2020. Their grandparents never stopped seeing and playing with them. Their pediatrician told them from the start they didn’t need to be scared of Covid and just be a little more careful to avoid grandpa and grandma if they felt sick. We discussed the statistics with them from the start - including adults are more likely to infect little kids than the other way around, but it’s still just a virus nobody asked for or deserved.
I plotted actual hospitalizations, which for NC was in reality around 780 at the predicted “peak” mid April 2020 against the March 25 “models” which claimed even with a shutdown there would be 30,000-40,000 that day. I printed John Ioannidis’s article in Stat from March 17, 2020 on March 17, 2020 and my mid April realized he was absolutely correct about the virus (he would prove correct about the entire 💩 show). I showed my kids the graph.
The hardest part is that we have needlessly dimmed the future of an entire generation and far too many are sticking their heads in the sand swearing it doesn’t matter because “kids are resilient.”
It was NEVER their burden. We trashed them anyway. To those paying attention it is devastating and heartbreaking. Yet none of the Covidians can acknowledge that, none of them even seem to really care, most seem more interested in defending their “reasoning” because they care more about wanting to be “right” than they will ever care about the generation of kids they flattened (even their own), and I’ve only heard ONE outspoken Covidian muster a simple “I was wrong and I am so very sorry.”
We can NEVER make right what we have done to children. We can acknowledge, apologize for it, and start giving them back what is left of their precious childhoods. But no, the sheep insist on staying in a haze, the media must fear monger about something to ensure the end of the world is coming as they seem determined to create a self-fulfilling prophecy, the politicians want endless emergencies and power and death and war and fear and hate and division and stupidity and control.
When will we as a society stop this? When will our children actually matter again? When will stop creating emergencies and start living in a society worth living in?
As a mom I will never stop fighting, and loving and playing and trying, but too often it feels like I am raising kids in a tiny band of rebels who are up against the entire world. I’m tired, and while I know I must go on for them because they are bright lights and thriving and their generation needs them to be that, I don’t know how long this is sustainable. We need help, not fear, not hysterics, not stupid destructive social theories and ridiculous ideologies, and sure as hell not WW III. 😩
I am currently in the middle of writing a fantasy type book with Christian themes for the age group 10-14ish I guess, although I think/hope anybody could enjoy it and get something out of it. My characters are that age group though, and I am giving them the power. The power to see that they are the generation that can actually turn things around if they have the courage to do so. They can stand up to the nonsense if they are empowered to do so. They can, as a group, decide to do away with all the lies they are being told and build their own parallel society, which will be shown to be better and they all feel better, so they know it's true. My kids are grown so I don't have to deal with your situation and it would be heart-breaking indeed. My prayers are with you.
I do work with a Christian organization in my community that helps the poverty stricken and we have gone around the rules (when they existed) as much as possible and stay "legal", to give the kids normalcy. I think the kids I see have done well.
Thank you for all you have done!!!! Being a light to kids right now is the best gift any of us could give them.
My daughter has read well over 700 books, just last week was the co-captain of the winning regional battle of the books team, and reads around 200 pages an hour (much faster than me, and she’s read more books than I have 🤦♀️). It’s how she is also a top club soccer player, swimmer, and straight A student. She’s also one of the sweetest humans I have ever known. Honestly I don’t know how we were so blesses with her (and her brother too). If you were interested in letting a book work read and review it that would mean a lot to her. At least let me know about it so I can get it for her!!!! Her school is always looking for great Christian themed books to (and author visits 😉). There are over 1,200 students.
She and her friends have rather enjoyed being rebels with no masks and still living life these last 2 years. We tell her often we are proud of her, and being a rebel is hard but fun when the data shows you will be remembered for being in the right side of history standing up against the misguided and objectively wrong mob. We stand with our kids too, we don’t make them stand alone. 😊
NCmom absolutely! That would be great and if she's interested, she can even help me write it by running ideas past her, or coming up with better dialogue etc. The little girl I'm mentoring just turned twelve and she is extremely creative and she is helping me, too. She sounds like a great human!! If you don't mind sending an email to Additional22js@gmail.com, then we can correspond better that way.
I'm a retired pharmacist with 38 years of community experience. In almost every one of those years I worked to help patients get around the scams, find affordable therapy options, delivered Rxs, babies, performed CPR, consulted with other professionals, attended funerals and weddings, pulled a lot of money out of my own pocket, worked in three states almost simultaneously, you name it, the list goes on and on.
It's not the sheep I cannot forgive, it is the fellow "professionals."
"Staying silent" is one thing, and damn understandable given various situations/responsibilities, after all we are not all "warriors," very damn few of us actually, between 1 and 2% as usually determined in actual combat, but promoting murder, injury, poisoning, control, loss of civil/medical rights and morality, all for a flippin' "Benjamin," or "status/position," or "to belong," or out of "convenience" or "comfort."
Well, we all will have to answer individually, not "collectively."
Anyone can get in your face and shout "You knew!"
But damn few practicing professionals did and most had no conception we were facing that kind of system wide conspiracy. Sure, I knew what a scam the Big Pharma had become. It was $4.95 for 500 Clorazepate 7.5mg (a mild Valium style drug, "Tranxene"), and then overnite it was $495.95. That destroyed my trust/faith around the early 90s. It only got worse, much much worse. But "murder for profit en mass?"
Thank the Lord I retired in 2017.
Like most, your wife bears no responsibility for any of this cluster.
Like me, Dr. Malone, and others she will have to bear embarrassment.
We have lost 2 millennium of respect, trust, even adulation, and we deserve it.
Have they ever apologized for anything, either party? Every "admission" seems to involve taxpayer money streamed directly to their lawyer friends, foundations, think tanks, and fellow Marxists and Perverts!
The elementary school playground near our house was "locked down" for over a year by the timorous butt wipes running the county schools. It used to host a spontaneous dog park/meeting but that's deader than dead now. It used to host cricket and soccer clubs. Not any more. A year ago I offered to wipe down the playground equipment once a day if these cowards would let the place open up for kids/dogs/basketball again. Nope, too dangerous. And the nearby vax happy parents told me I was wrong.
The playground is now only vital during the recesses of school days and the little kids are finally mask free. I can't see them playing and laughing without feeling a bit of bitterness towards the idiots in my county government.
Sounds like you live down the street from me 😕 same thing here. I keep taking my one year old pug to the dog park but no one is ever there. He runs around for about two minutes by himself and then he's done.
It's weird, isn't it? The dog owners used to congregate there every nice evening. I can't understand it. Why don't they come back? What I take from this is it's so easy to destroy human associations, not so easy to rebuild.
A guy friend says his softball league is dead. Guys aged out during covid panic and weren't replaced by recruits. Now it's dead. He used to play pick up basketball in local schools' courts, no more. That's dead.
Even my church choir...pfffft. Is it that that many people are still scared of the coof?
Oh and did you see that ridiculous fear tactic during the start of people out walking their dogs were more likely to get covid 🙄 How many idiots believed that?
I think it's more people just don't want to put up with the insane rules and regs. I know I don't go out much anywhere anymore here in NY because I just can't put up with the rules of "do they require masks, do I have to be vaxxed?" It's so much easier just to skip the whole thing. I do my runs in the park by myself and that's it. Socializing is dead. Govt killed it with the me-too freakoutism over this common cold.
I think a lot of things happened, more social people moved away, in the case of young people, I see with my own sons' age groups that they got so used to staying home they just don't leave anymore, not out of fear just out of a new routine of being lazy. We have a huge drop in lifeguards for our beach and pools so they can't open the pools, well they use teens for that and for almost two summers they didn't have the lifeguard program. It's like a supply chain issue that has affected normal human behavior.
I'm finally ready to start mentoring a school child again because the masks aren't required anymore. So many volunteer activities got killed by the shit mandates/mask rules. I can't sing in a local university chorale anymore because I am unvaxxed. List of institutionalized idiocies is shrinking but not totally gone to zero. Afraid we've suffered a head shot this past two years and societal TBI.
They really wanted us alone and scared - that's why congregating had to be stopped. No playgrounds, no bars, no church/synagogue, no libraries. Stay home and keep tabs on your noncompliant neighbors. Such sick and evil from start to finish.
Widow, alone, but not lonely, having a dog and 3 cats, I have made pathways in the wooded area of my yard, and walk them daily. Hardly ever saw a neighbor, go to the dumpster and the corner store once a week, to the larger store every 6 or 7 weeks, and to the hair dresser every month. Sounds lonely, and for a while it was, when I tried to invite a few friends, found out they were scared of me... then invited unjabbed and they did come. A few jabbers have since risked my doorstep because they need me (I am a seemstress). Before the lockdowns I helped out here and there, at sick or disabled friends. But most did not want me (because I was a carrier of disease) and the few remaining ones I told I was going to retire early. I did. My dog and cats love it, and after a short term of getting used to and then a short term of depression, I am now happier than ever. I have a 'garden' with mostly wild vegetables and the stores I go to never mandated masks. The few that did had to give me one. The store that did not has not seen me again. I prefer to drive 20 miles than to spend money in discriminating stores.
Your French is pretty good ! Thanks for the blog, it helps on the dark and rainy days !
Thanks, Ingrid. I hope I've been some sort of companion to people I've not met.
Props for rebelling when/where you could. And for staying strong despite the artificially imposed challenges. Life can be hard enough under normal circumstances. Let's continues to find stuff every day that makes us happy.
During the early days of the scamdemic my husband and I both worked from home. We are great friends and usually get along very well, but the 24/7 contact created friction and impatience with our respective foibles. I too, have spent a lot of the past 2 years outside walking. I was fortunate enough to relocate from the NYC area to a southern seaside town shortly before the pandemic started, so my walks are often on the beach, which is beautiful and always changing. But the sense of loneliness, disconnection, boredom has persisted. In April of last year, I returned to my therapy practice in person and it has helped. But just like in NY/NJ, things have changed for the worse: I encounter too many people clinging to their masks and their fear, and so many small businesses have permanently closed. I long to get back to “normal” but worry that normal is forever changed and fear / gullibility / conformity have become a permanent feature of our society.
Mar 23, 2022·edited Mar 23, 2022Liked by Mark Oshinskie
So sorry to hear your walks are boring and lonely. I take a three mile walk every day, year round, for 45 years, up and down hills, in the forest and love it! It is the touchstone of my day. It is more than just a vigorous work out. I immerse in nature to think and pray. Gorgeous vistas when the leaves are down and the unfolding seasons every day. Never boring.
I have spotted deer, rattlers, copperheads, beaver, and other assorted flora and fauna. Once I even spotted a cougar. What a thrill that was! Just a day or two ago, there was a black snake next to my trail. I rarely see a human. Maybe five in a year.
I am always amazed at how awesome is nature. Things may seem the same day after day and then, boom! Overnight, a storm has knocked out a grove of trees or the creek swells to a raging torrent or the trees are hung with dripping ice. I guess I find my walks in the forest both exciting and surprising and when they are "boring", I am happy, too. After all, most excitements and surprises are not all that good.
The church I was going to shut down and they were still masking and unsocial distancing even two weeks ago. So I found a new church where people are normal and it has been wonderful. Sometimes I attend events up to four times a week.
Luckily, my family has not been divided over this. Some got jabbed and suffered some reactions but no one has forced any other family members to jab or mask. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in 2020 with multiple households coming from three states. Nobody sick. In 2021, the host got a booster in mid-November and came down with covid just in time to cancel Thanksgiving.
I have tried to live my life as normally as possible and have endured being harassed, bullied, threatened, intimidated, denied service, and had the cops called on me for merely trying to go about my business like a normal human being. I avoid the mask and jab nazis as much as possible.
My business, which involved traveling to trade shows, has been shut down for two years and many events are not coming back. So my livelihood is in free fall and not sure if I will learn to fly or smack hard at the bottom. Still to be seen. But I do believe God is at work and will provide direction.
That's an interesting, uplifting and sad narrative, Crusader. Props for pushing on and resisting. Best wishes for a good work outcome.
I live in town. Nature is only in the background here. I like being around people and doing active stuff. Locking down and fearing are counter to my nature.
Great writing but depressing reading about your experience and that of Dani below, one of the commenters. I can't relate to much of it because of where I live, near Huntsville, AL, none of that took place for very long. We have many places to hike and I think out of a couple hundred hikes over the last two years, I saw only a few masked people early on. Restaurants/bars did the silly "mask until you get to your seat" thing for awhile, but the people I hang with pretty much all thought it was the BS it is.
One thing I do suggest for you to brighten up your walks is to get a dog! I highly recommend a pitsky, which is a cross of husky and pitbull and I've never had a better dog. Funny, talkative, loveable. Mine has two different colored eyes. People cannot help but start a conversation when they see her.
My daughters went to UA/Tuscaloosa. I liked the people I met on multiple trips down there. It's not surprising to learn that they figured the BS part earlier than their "sophisticated" Northern counterparts.
Pretty much same for me in East Tennessee. Hiking yesterday in the Smokies, sign on the door of a small visitor shop said something like “we’re federal, masks still required “ and no one inside had masks on. Country life is so much more sane.
I was two years into my divorce when The Virus hit. I can say it really made my depression worse. Not only was I grieving the loss of my marriage and the discovery of what my ex had done, but I had the added stress of Virusmania to adjust to. The light at the end of the tunnel for me prior to The Virus was I was finally going to get to travel the world, I was going to have enough money afterwards to see what my ex-husband would never see with me. I refuse to vaxx to do this so I guess that dream is gone. I find it quite depressing as I am not young.
I loved your essay. You have a gentle way of writing, and the added French was funny. I'm afraid you lost me at about paragraph eleven with the French though.
There are still places to go that don’t require vaccines, and I have hope more place will drop the requirements.
My cousin is a travel agent and she knows where you can go now. If you’re interested check out the link below. The design implies she only does tropical vacations but she does it all.
Lots of places don’t require a vax! Two of my bffs spent a month in Greece last May (21) and had no issues at all!! Mask on plane was it! I’ve personally been to Cozumel and twice to Cabo - no one asked about vax. Get packing, girl! Don’t let this madness stop you!!
Very well said, and mirrors much of what I've thought and felt over the past two years. I am one of the people who live alone, and since I don't speak French, recently the words "bored" and "lonely" have been flitting around in my head. I always feel like I can't complain, because I'm still employed, my employer does not require the jab (though I am the sole holdout). I used to go to an office every day in a City. Now I work remotely, most of the time, because of office policy. The few people who have returned to a hybrid mode keep their masks on and office doors closed. It's not the same, friendly and collaborative environment it once was. I never before realized how much I need that sort of normal, human interaction.
I know my neighborhood sooooooo well right now, from all of the walks. I am aware that my mental health is not what it used to be, and that what I need is to be around other people who are mentally healthy (i.e., not masked or fearful or believing the narrative). I am the only person I know in real life who is not jabbed and who does not believe the narrative. My entire extended family is jabbed, as are all of my friends. I don't have the other person at home to talk to, or to look at. Wanting to see another, unmasked face in real life as opposed to virtually. It's been brutal, and I talk myself into passable mental health on a daily, sometimes hourly basis.
What I need is hope for a better future. If I am honest, I don't have that right now. I know that is bleak and not good mental health, so I try to manufacture what I believe that would feel like..... because for most of my life I've had it, I can conjure up a reasonable facsimile. It gets me through. But this is a painful and diminished existence. I'm fully aware that in other places in the U.S., people are fairly normal, and I'd feel great living in one of those other places, and moving is not an option for me right now. Travelling (vacation) is also not an option, due to financial constraints.
Since you wondered..... one person (who live's alone)'s experience.
I really appreciate that you (skillfully) wrote this down, Dani. I am interested in other people's experiences.
The architects of the Scamdemic and their backers have acted throughout like locking down and masking had no downside. It's the Big Lie.
I have to believe there were enough people who knew exactly what they were doing; they can't have ALL (certainly many) been so divorced from the normal rhythms of human life to imagine that this wouldn't devastate us.
There was absolute willful cruelty at work. Maybe even a certain sadistic pleasure at the ability to wield that kind of power. Which is why I still hate them and want them to suffer before their ends.
Their goal was and is devastation. Dirt naps for all responsible
Yes, absolutely. Now when they are openly reporting that vitamin D levels, exercise and obesity all play a huge role in covid outcomes, to me it's even more obvious that they knew this and wanted us all more susceptible to covid.
Yes! The gaslighting has and continues to be epic. When the "conspiracy" becomes fact it's obvious.
You would think these governors would come out and say "I'm so sorry, we just didn't have enough information at the time," but no, nothing. Which tells me they knew all along.
Even tho “cases” are exploding everywhere, the worst of the governors (including mine) claim they were able to reopen & drop mandates because their totalitarian edicts & mass vax’s made it possible! And now the despicable troll, Faux-Xi is throwing trial balloons about being “flexible” in bringing all of that s#¡+ back! My guess is right before the midterms….
Why would governors in NY, NJ, Mass. etc. admit that they made mistakes ? That wouldn’t fit with the narrative.
Very insightful piece by Mr. Oshinskie .... thankfully the Covid-19 hysteria is finally receding, but many Covidians are still afraid to venture outside without a mask on.... the “new normal” in 2022.
Laurie, your comment got me to thinking. Would a newspaper, lets say the NYT or WAPO allow a full page ad which just stated...." Its obvious, what was conspiracy is now fact"? Would that statement draw censorship?
Wouldn't that be something!
I'd rather credit human ego and stupidity. I worked for the federal government long enough to see plenty of that.
I have known some high level intelligence officials. They are incompetent. Never think things through. The only thing they are good at is shifting blame.
Well- they certainly have *acted* as if there would be no downside. And yet it seems to me that evidence is accumulating that - in fact - our downside is exactly the designed and built upside for the powers which seek to profit from any and all human energy, from every human's cradle-to-grave span.
Destruction of the social fabric was the plan, so that in our isolation we all become ever more dependent on random acts of false benevolence from our jailers. Your story of being maskless at church is one more example of how thorough is this effort.
What you do here is an essential antidote. What I do by me is keep the doors open on a small family biz, a place of maskless faces where a smile and a conversation is always on offer to anyone who steps inside. Casual contact and common physical experience- such that it is, in its small zip code. So many days this feels like building a sand castle as the tide rolls in - but as I think to Camus and Sartre - whatever else is there?
Destruction of the social fabric was the plan: 100% agree.
I believe our “betters” see the despair & demoralization as an “upside”….
Your story is heartbreaking. I am so very sad for you. I know hubbs and I have also suffered mentally from this. I was forced to get the first two jabs (no more, never) in order for me to care for my father at his fancy neighborhood.
I have developed a thyroid disorder and several other medical problems. No one can fully attribute it to the vaxx but I have been reading and searching.
I am grateful that you shared your misery. You are certainly not "alone"
we are fortunate to have internet where we can find like minded intelligence to engage ourselves and feel stronger.
God Bless
We pray for you, Rosemary, and so many like you, every day.
Thanks for sharing, Dani. I've wondered how I would be faring had my circumstances been what yours are. The truth is, I live in one of those other places where life remained relatively 'normal'. When you have a bar or a church on every corner and often a bar right next door to a church, well, we're a breed of folks who fly American Flags from nearly every house on the street and cherish personal freedom and privacy above all else. Sounds redneck - I'll own that. But there were many in my area who complied with masks, jabs, and closings. And that hurt my heart because living in fear is no life at all. But neither is living in solidarity feeling lonely with no options to escape the reality of your situation. Fight back, Dani, find a way, forge a new path, conjure the existence you want by taking solid steps outside your comfort zone. Walking is nice, it's something I enjoy doing, but… I related to how Mark feels walking alone, doing so too often causes a strange kind of lonely feeling to bubble up. If you find that something to tap into, I hope you'll update us. I could be you if I lived where you are, so I'll be thinking of you positively and lovingly and throwing vibes of strength and wellbeing in your direction.
"redneck" - in my opinion - is a misused term. most "rednecks" I know are really just salt of the earth types, a bit rough around the edges, but are the folks I want around me if the poop hits the fan. my town sounds a lot like yours. and i am grateful for that.
I should replace redneck with 'salt of the earth folks' - so much more fitting. :)
Your point about being the only person you know.... I have now found two people at my employer who are in my same state - countdown to termination due to the unvaxxed state. While I had my people not jabbed (immediate family, parents, one professional in my field with whom I work closely) that have given me support throughout this, finding the two people going through the same experience has been a lifeline. I knew both of them, but we didn't know our shared state. I have been vocal (under my real identity) about freedom and inclusion on LinkedIn but not my thoughts on vaccines, due to fear of cancellation. But I've spoken out enough that these two people decided to reach out. It is a lifeline. Second connection actually made this week. The real life people are there, and I hope you find them. Until then, Dani, your online community wants to provide support. Thank you for sharing your story.
I am so sorry. I can't imagine what it would have been like to go through this alone. I really pray that you can move somewhere "normal." I was so fortunate to be able to take my two sons to Texas last spring and the first time we sat in a restaurant brimming with people (California still had no inside dining then) I cried. To be able to live like humans again for six weeks did so much for our mental health.
I don't know what your beliefs are but most people in my church are not jabbed, we never wore masks in church when we opened up against the mandates and we are pretty much like minded on the topic. I know all churches aren't like this.
I also found a like-minded community at my church. We never had a sign on our doors proclaiming adherence to petty government tyranny. People were always welcome to mask or not mask as they saw fit. And the vast majority chose not to mask the entire time. It makes SUCH a difference to have at least one place/facet in your life where you can relax and feel supported and not be in defense-mode.
I am sorry for your isolation and pain. Here is a way to start a group. This is from Pam Popper, Make America Free Again. https://makeamericansfreeagain.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Thursday-MAFA-Meetings.pdf
Nearly every sentence you wrote struck that "bell". I too have kept a very close watch on my mental state, well aware of what was gradually happening. I too took daily walks, forced myself out, though with the "crossing the street rather than pass me on the same side walk" was a constant occurrence; but also the looks in the eyes (since the masks covered all else) of those near our community mail station which contains a pigeon hole box for every resident. My approach to this outdoor facility, without a mask, caused a look of "sheer terror" in the eyes of many I did not actually know by name, but here to fore had always chatted and joked with previous to Covid. Now, they backed away as I approached my box to get my mail, and by "backed away", I mean very visibly removing themselves far more than 6' from me. With their masks AND face shields of clear plastic, attached to a kind of headband, and sticking out a good 5-6 inches all the way around the face (I assume to give the virus microbes a clear path in ? ). They would usually have already put on their gloves. People brought all types to the mail station: white cotton "church" type, bicycling and weight lifting, knitted winter gloves, "dressy" leather, etc. etc. Seems people just brought whatever was on hand in a drawer or shelf, even gardening gloves. Some had fancy packets of disposable gloves, like some folks keep in the car to keep the smell of gasoline off their hands when filling up. All this only served to make me "second guess" myself, to worry if it was really I whose mental health was deteriorating ? I too live alone, have retired, and have always been engaged in a very wide range of leisure and travel activities, physical sports, and social engagements. This has been a challenge. Simple things like playing golf at the neighborhood course changed drastically, no longer were people more than happy to welcome someone to make a foursome. It took a very deliberate effort entirely on my part, to find ways to interact with other people. I got on a list to purchase a bicycle and finally got one, nothing fancy, not a mountain bike, just a plain old bicycle, larger tires, and I had to build up leg strength to peddle for long rides, but it was worth it. It IS a painful and diminished existence as you described. I realize financial constraints are a tough challenge, but if at all possible, try to make a long range plan to move to a less restrictive area than your present home, it is so worth it for both your mental and physical health. Just making such a plan can engage the mind and lead you to contact people in other areas even if the engagement is only via internet, text, and phone. Working on such a project can really help. We all need those kinds of big projects that hold promise of a big pay off in the future. I happen to live in an area where such strict isolating regulations were very short lived. Within just a few weeks, our local and state government realized the effect this could have on both the physical and mental health of residents, and decided the best plan was to urge people to get out to the state parks, beaches, walking and riding trails, any kind of outdoor exercise according to ability. Get in shape, loose weight, exercise daily, and eat a healthy diet became the official message for the state !
I’m so sorry to hear this. I don’t know your circumstances or if you could or even wish to make a change, but there are places where not everyone is vaxxed or masked. You have my sympathy. It’s difficult to live happily that way.
This piece has given me an unanticipated new angle on my grief over all we've lost as a human society. Your writing is clear, yet gentle, as it maps this long unfolding of the emptiness that's both outside in the neighborhoods and inside so many hearts. Your gentle touch - like a warm hand on a shoulder at the right moment- is what released this layer of grief for me. For months and months I've mostly kept a semblance of functionality by being angry more often than sad. But that won't work in the long haul for any of us hoping to maintain real connection with any other humans...
Thank you for the reminder.
Excellent article. I can attest to the over-exposure to family. I'm a sandwich generation. I have both my 18 yo kids and my late 70s parents in the same household. Which while I was working in NYC with young twins was a fabulous arrangement. Once the kids started driving became less necessary and moreso since I now work from home. I really don't get out much at all since the office closed, partially reopened and then went vax required. Masks where required, like you I refuse to wear one. Now they've permanently closed the office and sublet the office space. I'm kind of tired of seeing the same faces day in and day out. Love my parents but I've had way to much together time with them, even more-so since they've bought into the scamdemic narrative. At least they aren't giving me too hard a time about declining the vax for myself and the very healthy twins.
When the lockdown started, I was 8 months into a grief journey having lost the love of my life very suddenly the previous July. It was devastating. I had made baby steps along the path, been in counseling for a couple of month, found a new job, and could get through the better part of the day without dissolving into a puddle of tears. I was actually looking forward to being in an office regularly for the first time in 8 months (btw lost my job 10 days after i lost my love). And then came the lockdown and the isolation, the fear, the outright crazy. It set me back to the beginning on the path.
I still fight with the notion that we've sacrificed the present for a future that isn't guaranteed. Tomorrow is never definite. Hell, the next hour is never guaranteed. I learned that the hard way in July 2019. at 2:15pm I got a text that he wasn't feeling well and called an ambulance. At 4:35, at little over two hours later, he was gone. We need to stop fearing the unknown. When did we go from being the enthusiastic, risk seeking bold young country to being afraid of any risk? This is no way to live. While I'm not advocating for living reckless like every minute could be your last, why bother saving money or eating right for there's no tomorrow. I'm not that nihilistic. But what we've done, or more precisely have had done to us, over the last two years is insane. Finding others of like mind in the last year has been extremely helpful, along with meditation and journaling that I'm a functional human again who's looking to live and not just survive.
I started volunteering at the sign in desk of a local homeless shelter when I thought they wouldn't be assholes about masking. Getting to know the men there makes me thankful for them. We're all fragile in our ways; these guys know it better than I do. They take a day at a time. It makes me so glad for all the people in my life, even those I don't like. Life is short whether we get killed by a virus or not. Each day is a gift. I don't ever take anyone for granted.
Thank you for your reply. Taking life a day at a time and nothing for granted is how we should be living! I'm moving out of my horribly blue area for a free state in a few months and will be looking for opportunities to volunteer like you do.
I spent from 9 to 17 in Ramsey, NJ in the late 60s early 70s and can't imagine that town squashed by covid. It was a fantastic place to grow up. We left for the Adirondacks when taxes started being confiscatory, 1971. We live on the eastern shore of Maryland now and it's at least balanced. People are hereditary Dems but think and act conservative.
Still shut my eyes and see Ramsey's streets.
I'm a born and raised (still live here) Fair Lawnite. Used to work up Ramsey way for a lawyer. This was a great area to grow up and I've gotten my kids to 18 here. But the last two years have turned me from never consider leaving the area to buying a house under construction in S.C. I spent almost 3 years working in Montgomery Co MD and found it was by far not conservative so MD and VA were quickly kicked out of my list of possible destinations. I really wanted a reliably red state. While ideally I want to go to FL because DeSantis is AWESOME, the kids vetoed that. I have hopes Ron will be pres :)
Montgomery County, in fact, most of the Western Shore counties of Maryland are pretty left leaning. The flood of DC people to those counties has made them awful. The counties east of Chesapeake Bay are way more conservative and laissez faire. Still saddled with the same RINO governor but we've had much worse. Our two Dem senators utterly worthless. Our Congressional rep is a pretty decent Republican. We have a lot of refugees here from West of the Bay, Pennsylvania and NJ.
I'm sorry you will be pressured into leaving Fair Lawn after growing up there and raising kids. Florida's climate doesn't agree with me but it's got some very sweet spots. Hard to know where to flee. I will say Savannah Georgia is a favorite city. People laid back and so different from the nosey Nellies of Metro DC Baltimore. If I had to leave MD now it'd either be Arizona near Phoenix, dust bowl that it is, or Savannah.
God bless you. Best of luck.
Well one thing's for sure, the scamdemic has inspired you to write some super articles. Put that in the plus column.
The Scamdemic enlightened me. I realized the precarious situation I was in and that the Demoncrats were out to destroy all of our lives. It's true, it came true, and the deniers are suffering. I am no longer suffering. The lockdowns propelled me to get off my butt (which gained 20 lbs during 2020) and move out of my birthplace, Commifornia, for good. I have had my business in Texas since 2010 so off I went to the fly-over state. Voila! No masks . . . or not enough to bother an anti-masker like me. My friends are living normal lives and having fun, social gatherings, etc. I felt like I went through a time-warp . . . it's like Covid never happened in Texas. I'm selling my ranch in Commifornia as we speak. I will never return to that Hellhole - never. I now hate Demoncrats and Libtards when I used to just despise them for their ignorance. If intolerance is a symptom of being subjected to two years of Coronalies, I confess I have a severe case. The fact that our lives were destroyed by politicians with single-digit IQs baffles me. I've lost faith in half of America for their willingness to fall in line and drink the Kool-Aid! Other than that, I'm grateful that I have found peace and a safe place - at least for now.
Wonderfully written and thank you. Change the details and scenery and many of us share the same melancholy about what society and life has become. While it’s more normal here, my family is unvaccinated and so my husband hasn’t been “invited” back to his office, they are saying maybe June. Target looks like a subsidiary of the Taliban. People are socially distancing in their cars at stop lights. Kids have gone from a beacon of joy and determination to blah just getting through each day, particularly those trapped in public schools that were home so long and only very recently released from pointless dehumanizing masks.
As a mom what makes me so melancholy is for my kids. We’ve traveled, they’ve been in private school where mask exemptions amount to a “my kid isn’t wearing one” note from parents, they have gone to activities. Excepting school, other children are missing. When we travel it’s mostly adults, even to places like a family resort in Jamaica we visit often most recently a few months ago. We go out to eat during weekend hops to the mountains and they wonder why they see grandparents and not families. At the beach, hiking, lakes, everything except going to FL - adults everywhere and half attendance at specifically kid oriented stuff.
My kids are 8 and 10. They were sent home from school, one they never returned to and never got to say goodbye to, just before the youngest turned 6, and the oldest was 8. Today they are having a hard time hanging onto memories of what normal life even was. I can’t help but tear up just thinking about it.
I ask them ever couple weeks if they remember a long trip to southern CA and Jamaica in 2019? Do they remember normal happy faces? Do they remember strangers smiling at them and talking to them out and about? The older one says she has to think really hard to remember and it’s getting harder. The younger says his mind is playing tricks on him. He knows nobody was wearing a mask, but his brain can’t make sense of that. He says his memories are with no masks but his brain wants to put masks on people and it makes him really sad to think about it because he doesn’t know if he can really remember. 💔💔💔
The hardest part is that they have been as shielded as any children in NC. By May 2020 they were going to outdoor day camp for children of “essential” workers a few days a week. No masks. We were on the beaches of Hilton Head when BLM riots and curfews broke out at home. We’ve gone to free places as much as we can. They got to go to school in person the whole time from mid August 2020. Their grandparents never stopped seeing and playing with them. Their pediatrician told them from the start they didn’t need to be scared of Covid and just be a little more careful to avoid grandpa and grandma if they felt sick. We discussed the statistics with them from the start - including adults are more likely to infect little kids than the other way around, but it’s still just a virus nobody asked for or deserved.
I plotted actual hospitalizations, which for NC was in reality around 780 at the predicted “peak” mid April 2020 against the March 25 “models” which claimed even with a shutdown there would be 30,000-40,000 that day. I printed John Ioannidis’s article in Stat from March 17, 2020 on March 17, 2020 and my mid April realized he was absolutely correct about the virus (he would prove correct about the entire 💩 show). I showed my kids the graph.
The hardest part is that we have needlessly dimmed the future of an entire generation and far too many are sticking their heads in the sand swearing it doesn’t matter because “kids are resilient.”
It was NEVER their burden. We trashed them anyway. To those paying attention it is devastating and heartbreaking. Yet none of the Covidians can acknowledge that, none of them even seem to really care, most seem more interested in defending their “reasoning” because they care more about wanting to be “right” than they will ever care about the generation of kids they flattened (even their own), and I’ve only heard ONE outspoken Covidian muster a simple “I was wrong and I am so very sorry.”
We can NEVER make right what we have done to children. We can acknowledge, apologize for it, and start giving them back what is left of their precious childhoods. But no, the sheep insist on staying in a haze, the media must fear monger about something to ensure the end of the world is coming as they seem determined to create a self-fulfilling prophecy, the politicians want endless emergencies and power and death and war and fear and hate and division and stupidity and control.
When will we as a society stop this? When will our children actually matter again? When will stop creating emergencies and start living in a society worth living in?
As a mom I will never stop fighting, and loving and playing and trying, but too often it feels like I am raising kids in a tiny band of rebels who are up against the entire world. I’m tired, and while I know I must go on for them because they are bright lights and thriving and their generation needs them to be that, I don’t know how long this is sustainable. We need help, not fear, not hysterics, not stupid destructive social theories and ridiculous ideologies, and sure as hell not WW III. 😩
I am currently in the middle of writing a fantasy type book with Christian themes for the age group 10-14ish I guess, although I think/hope anybody could enjoy it and get something out of it. My characters are that age group though, and I am giving them the power. The power to see that they are the generation that can actually turn things around if they have the courage to do so. They can stand up to the nonsense if they are empowered to do so. They can, as a group, decide to do away with all the lies they are being told and build their own parallel society, which will be shown to be better and they all feel better, so they know it's true. My kids are grown so I don't have to deal with your situation and it would be heart-breaking indeed. My prayers are with you.
I do work with a Christian organization in my community that helps the poverty stricken and we have gone around the rules (when they existed) as much as possible and stay "legal", to give the kids normalcy. I think the kids I see have done well.
Thank you for all you have done!!!! Being a light to kids right now is the best gift any of us could give them.
My daughter has read well over 700 books, just last week was the co-captain of the winning regional battle of the books team, and reads around 200 pages an hour (much faster than me, and she’s read more books than I have 🤦♀️). It’s how she is also a top club soccer player, swimmer, and straight A student. She’s also one of the sweetest humans I have ever known. Honestly I don’t know how we were so blesses with her (and her brother too). If you were interested in letting a book work read and review it that would mean a lot to her. At least let me know about it so I can get it for her!!!! Her school is always looking for great Christian themed books to (and author visits 😉). There are over 1,200 students.
She and her friends have rather enjoyed being rebels with no masks and still living life these last 2 years. We tell her often we are proud of her, and being a rebel is hard but fun when the data shows you will be remembered for being in the right side of history standing up against the misguided and objectively wrong mob. We stand with our kids too, we don’t make them stand alone. 😊
NCmom absolutely! That would be great and if she's interested, she can even help me write it by running ideas past her, or coming up with better dialogue etc. The little girl I'm mentoring just turned twelve and she is extremely creative and she is helping me, too. She sounds like a great human!! If you don't mind sending an email to Additional22js@gmail.com, then we can correspond better that way.
She’s interested. I’ll email today. Thank you.
I will do that!!! Probably won’t be until later tonight. Thank you. She’d love to!!
😭
It’s really depressing how stupid this whole thing really was.
In San Francisco, it was almost two years of closed gyms and hockey rinks. I couldn't play basketball or skate.
I'm not sure I can ever forgive any of the sheep.
I'm a retired pharmacist with 38 years of community experience. In almost every one of those years I worked to help patients get around the scams, find affordable therapy options, delivered Rxs, babies, performed CPR, consulted with other professionals, attended funerals and weddings, pulled a lot of money out of my own pocket, worked in three states almost simultaneously, you name it, the list goes on and on.
It's not the sheep I cannot forgive, it is the fellow "professionals."
Well said my wife is a Doctor and she stayed quiet.
"Staying silent" is one thing, and damn understandable given various situations/responsibilities, after all we are not all "warriors," very damn few of us actually, between 1 and 2% as usually determined in actual combat, but promoting murder, injury, poisoning, control, loss of civil/medical rights and morality, all for a flippin' "Benjamin," or "status/position," or "to belong," or out of "convenience" or "comfort."
Well, we all will have to answer individually, not "collectively."
Anyone can get in your face and shout "You knew!"
But damn few practicing professionals did and most had no conception we were facing that kind of system wide conspiracy. Sure, I knew what a scam the Big Pharma had become. It was $4.95 for 500 Clorazepate 7.5mg (a mild Valium style drug, "Tranxene"), and then overnite it was $495.95. That destroyed my trust/faith around the early 90s. It only got worse, much much worse. But "murder for profit en mass?"
Thank the Lord I retired in 2017.
Like most, your wife bears no responsibility for any of this cluster.
Like me, Dr. Malone, and others she will have to bear embarrassment.
We have lost 2 millennium of respect, trust, even adulation, and we deserve it.
I do hold doctors accountable. Staying silent is unacceptable.
Yes, but so is suicide.
No collective guilt.
But a damn lot of individual guilt to go around, to all of us I suppose.
Why? I have a friend that is a doctor at the hospital and she simply says "oh this isn't about a virus," but won't say anymore.
It isn't what she says, but what she does that really counts.
Many are forced to self-censure.
It isn't her words she will have to answer for.
the left does not care.
This was all of their doing. "the ends justify the means"
They own this abomination,
Too bad for any of us that got "depressed".... "so sorry about all of those suicides" "You could have avoided those family breakups, but sorry anyway"
"Now those jabs - sorry about all of that too."
Mean time, our country continues in open fresh air, to pound the January 6
These people are criminals
Except they're not sorry about the shots. They don't apologize for anything. It was all for our own good.
of course not! They are not only criminals, they have lack of conscience in their accountability for their destruction
Have they ever apologized for anything, either party? Every "admission" seems to involve taxpayer money streamed directly to their lawyer friends, foundations, think tanks, and fellow Marxists and Perverts!
Colin Powell did for the invasion of Iraq....... that’s the only one I can think of. 😩
Excellent point, but only a beginning, even for him.
The elementary school playground near our house was "locked down" for over a year by the timorous butt wipes running the county schools. It used to host a spontaneous dog park/meeting but that's deader than dead now. It used to host cricket and soccer clubs. Not any more. A year ago I offered to wipe down the playground equipment once a day if these cowards would let the place open up for kids/dogs/basketball again. Nope, too dangerous. And the nearby vax happy parents told me I was wrong.
The playground is now only vital during the recesses of school days and the little kids are finally mask free. I can't see them playing and laughing without feeling a bit of bitterness towards the idiots in my county government.
Sounds like you live down the street from me 😕 same thing here. I keep taking my one year old pug to the dog park but no one is ever there. He runs around for about two minutes by himself and then he's done.
It's weird, isn't it? The dog owners used to congregate there every nice evening. I can't understand it. Why don't they come back? What I take from this is it's so easy to destroy human associations, not so easy to rebuild.
A guy friend says his softball league is dead. Guys aged out during covid panic and weren't replaced by recruits. Now it's dead. He used to play pick up basketball in local schools' courts, no more. That's dead.
Even my church choir...pfffft. Is it that that many people are still scared of the coof?
Oh and did you see that ridiculous fear tactic during the start of people out walking their dogs were more likely to get covid 🙄 How many idiots believed that?
I think it's more people just don't want to put up with the insane rules and regs. I know I don't go out much anywhere anymore here in NY because I just can't put up with the rules of "do they require masks, do I have to be vaxxed?" It's so much easier just to skip the whole thing. I do my runs in the park by myself and that's it. Socializing is dead. Govt killed it with the me-too freakoutism over this common cold.
I think a lot of things happened, more social people moved away, in the case of young people, I see with my own sons' age groups that they got so used to staying home they just don't leave anymore, not out of fear just out of a new routine of being lazy. We have a huge drop in lifeguards for our beach and pools so they can't open the pools, well they use teens for that and for almost two summers they didn't have the lifeguard program. It's like a supply chain issue that has affected normal human behavior.
I'm finally ready to start mentoring a school child again because the masks aren't required anymore. So many volunteer activities got killed by the shit mandates/mask rules. I can't sing in a local university chorale anymore because I am unvaxxed. List of institutionalized idiocies is shrinking but not totally gone to zero. Afraid we've suffered a head shot this past two years and societal TBI.
They really wanted us alone and scared - that's why congregating had to be stopped. No playgrounds, no bars, no church/synagogue, no libraries. Stay home and keep tabs on your noncompliant neighbors. Such sick and evil from start to finish.
Widow, alone, but not lonely, having a dog and 3 cats, I have made pathways in the wooded area of my yard, and walk them daily. Hardly ever saw a neighbor, go to the dumpster and the corner store once a week, to the larger store every 6 or 7 weeks, and to the hair dresser every month. Sounds lonely, and for a while it was, when I tried to invite a few friends, found out they were scared of me... then invited unjabbed and they did come. A few jabbers have since risked my doorstep because they need me (I am a seemstress). Before the lockdowns I helped out here and there, at sick or disabled friends. But most did not want me (because I was a carrier of disease) and the few remaining ones I told I was going to retire early. I did. My dog and cats love it, and after a short term of getting used to and then a short term of depression, I am now happier than ever. I have a 'garden' with mostly wild vegetables and the stores I go to never mandated masks. The few that did had to give me one. The store that did not has not seen me again. I prefer to drive 20 miles than to spend money in discriminating stores.
Your French is pretty good ! Thanks for the blog, it helps on the dark and rainy days !
Thanks, Ingrid. I hope I've been some sort of companion to people I've not met.
Props for rebelling when/where you could. And for staying strong despite the artificially imposed challenges. Life can be hard enough under normal circumstances. Let's continues to find stuff every day that makes us happy.
Good advice - I certainly long for the “normal” life difficulties………before this nightmare of a plandemic…………
During the early days of the scamdemic my husband and I both worked from home. We are great friends and usually get along very well, but the 24/7 contact created friction and impatience with our respective foibles. I too, have spent a lot of the past 2 years outside walking. I was fortunate enough to relocate from the NYC area to a southern seaside town shortly before the pandemic started, so my walks are often on the beach, which is beautiful and always changing. But the sense of loneliness, disconnection, boredom has persisted. In April of last year, I returned to my therapy practice in person and it has helped. But just like in NY/NJ, things have changed for the worse: I encounter too many people clinging to their masks and their fear, and so many small businesses have permanently closed. I long to get back to “normal” but worry that normal is forever changed and fear / gullibility / conformity have become a permanent feature of our society.
So agree. How can we get this message through to the powers that be. The “new reality” is deteriorating the human spirit.
They already know. That's the intent.
You'll have nothing and be happy.
and be unhappy
For us freedom lovers (normal people), yes. For the Covidiots, I think they'll be fine with stifling rules.
BINGO
So sorry to hear your walks are boring and lonely. I take a three mile walk every day, year round, for 45 years, up and down hills, in the forest and love it! It is the touchstone of my day. It is more than just a vigorous work out. I immerse in nature to think and pray. Gorgeous vistas when the leaves are down and the unfolding seasons every day. Never boring.
I have spotted deer, rattlers, copperheads, beaver, and other assorted flora and fauna. Once I even spotted a cougar. What a thrill that was! Just a day or two ago, there was a black snake next to my trail. I rarely see a human. Maybe five in a year.
I am always amazed at how awesome is nature. Things may seem the same day after day and then, boom! Overnight, a storm has knocked out a grove of trees or the creek swells to a raging torrent or the trees are hung with dripping ice. I guess I find my walks in the forest both exciting and surprising and when they are "boring", I am happy, too. After all, most excitements and surprises are not all that good.
The church I was going to shut down and they were still masking and unsocial distancing even two weeks ago. So I found a new church where people are normal and it has been wonderful. Sometimes I attend events up to four times a week.
Luckily, my family has not been divided over this. Some got jabbed and suffered some reactions but no one has forced any other family members to jab or mask. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving in 2020 with multiple households coming from three states. Nobody sick. In 2021, the host got a booster in mid-November and came down with covid just in time to cancel Thanksgiving.
I have tried to live my life as normally as possible and have endured being harassed, bullied, threatened, intimidated, denied service, and had the cops called on me for merely trying to go about my business like a normal human being. I avoid the mask and jab nazis as much as possible.
My business, which involved traveling to trade shows, has been shut down for two years and many events are not coming back. So my livelihood is in free fall and not sure if I will learn to fly or smack hard at the bottom. Still to be seen. But I do believe God is at work and will provide direction.
That's an interesting, uplifting and sad narrative, Crusader. Props for pushing on and resisting. Best wishes for a good work outcome.
I live in town. Nature is only in the background here. I like being around people and doing active stuff. Locking down and fearing are counter to my nature.
“And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” John Muir
Great writing but depressing reading about your experience and that of Dani below, one of the commenters. I can't relate to much of it because of where I live, near Huntsville, AL, none of that took place for very long. We have many places to hike and I think out of a couple hundred hikes over the last two years, I saw only a few masked people early on. Restaurants/bars did the silly "mask until you get to your seat" thing for awhile, but the people I hang with pretty much all thought it was the BS it is.
One thing I do suggest for you to brighten up your walks is to get a dog! I highly recommend a pitsky, which is a cross of husky and pitbull and I've never had a better dog. Funny, talkative, loveable. Mine has two different colored eyes. People cannot help but start a conversation when they see her.
My daughters went to UA/Tuscaloosa. I liked the people I met on multiple trips down there. It's not surprising to learn that they figured the BS part earlier than their "sophisticated" Northern counterparts.
But I'm NJ born and bred. And I knew from Day 1.
Pretty much same for me in East Tennessee. Hiking yesterday in the Smokies, sign on the door of a small visitor shop said something like “we’re federal, masks still required “ and no one inside had masks on. Country life is so much more sane.
Such a beautiful idea. It's heartbreaking that landlords make it so difficult to keep a pet.
Beautiful piece.
I was two years into my divorce when The Virus hit. I can say it really made my depression worse. Not only was I grieving the loss of my marriage and the discovery of what my ex had done, but I had the added stress of Virusmania to adjust to. The light at the end of the tunnel for me prior to The Virus was I was finally going to get to travel the world, I was going to have enough money afterwards to see what my ex-husband would never see with me. I refuse to vaxx to do this so I guess that dream is gone. I find it quite depressing as I am not young.
I loved your essay. You have a gentle way of writing, and the added French was funny. I'm afraid you lost me at about paragraph eleven with the French though.
There are still places to go that don’t require vaccines, and I have hope more place will drop the requirements.
My cousin is a travel agent and she knows where you can go now. If you’re interested check out the link below. The design implies she only does tropical vacations but she does it all.
Don’t let go of the dream!
https://bferguson.dreamvacations.com/travel/HomePage.html
Lots of places don’t require a vax! Two of my bffs spent a month in Greece last May (21) and had no issues at all!! Mask on plane was it! I’ve personally been to Cozumel and twice to Cabo - no one asked about vax. Get packing, girl! Don’t let this madness stop you!!