When people live together in a household or community, the protection against contagious illness works best when all members agree on following guidelines to minimize risk.
My husband is more comfortable with mingling with other people right now than I am. Thursday a friend who lives in the independent apartments came to our condo to give us an anniversary card. My husband promptly invited her inside to sit in our recliner and visit. I felt it would be rude to oppose him, but I was not happy with the situation. She told us she had recently had lunch with a friend at Ruby Tuesday so she is out mingling. My husband also crossed over the berm between our condos to talk with the neighbor who was sitting on his patio. Neither wore masks; the two men were less than 3 feet apart. My spouse is ready and willing to eat often in restaurants. I am a bit reluctant.
I am working like crazy in the grocery stores to social distance, but my efforts aren't worth much if my partner introduces the virus into our home. I must admit that I have a dental appointment at the end of June that I plan to keep; he canceled his. So our assessments of risk and what we are willing to do differ.
Our county had about 200 cases of Covid-19 June 4th. Now on June 12th it has 306. Grace Village has 2 more employees that tested positive (for a total of 3). I feel like staying home more while my husband is out and about happy things are reopening. I do plan to go to the public library next week during "senior hour"; this will be its first time open for use since March 24th, though it did some curbside pickup service the past few weeks.
Thursday we did expose ourselves to risk by eating in a restaurant and shopping. At Kohl's, there were many people without masks. After I browsed for some rugs on the second level, I was not happy to discover the down escalator had been shut down while I was shopping. I had to use the elevator. The family in front of me in line consisted of an unmasked mother and 3 children under 5. She pushed the elevator button. When the elevator arrived, they piled in. The lady behind me (unmasked) said aren't you getting on. When I answered no she hurriedly joined the family. Yes 5 people could fit, but was that wise? As I stepped up to the elevator button, I noticed there was a sign that said 1 person or 1 party at a time. I bumped the button with my elbow. When my turn came, I invited the masked lady behind me to join me if she wanted, with each of us in separate corners. There were probably over a dozen people waiting to ride down. At least, with another person joining me, we speeded things up a tad. So even when you think you are not taking much risk, things can go much differently and increase that risk.
I am grateful to be surrounded by nature. It cheers me a bit to watch the birds and see what plants are blooming. The Asiatic lilies started opening the past few days.
My anniversary bouquet had a single red rose among the purple, pink, and yellow flowers. I put it in a budvase where I think it looks better by itself.
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We have been watching Downton Abbey the past few weeks. My sister gave me several years ago a DVD set of the first two seasons. I had forgotten some of the incidents, but of course not Mr. Pamuk.
Grace Village has hired a new CEO to start mid-July working beside the current one until January when the current one retires. Too bad he has to face Covid-19 in the campus now; I am sure when he signed on we still didn't have any cases. His abilities will have to arise to meet new challenges.
All of us have new challenges these days.
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