Two years
March 11, 2022 marks two years since the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic. With multiple variants including the present Omicron and BA.2 being the latest and most contagious, we seem to be finally in a position to stretch our wings a little. The numbers are going down. In the last two months so many people either got Covid, or they got their second or third dose of the vaccine. Enough people did this to put us in the place we are now. This place is seeing hospitalizations going down with just over 700 in Ontario today in contrast to mid January numbers which were crazy high. If I remember correctly it was around 4000. The highest through the entire pandemic and not by a little, by a long shot. As of March 21st, the day after March break, all mandates will be lifted including masking. There are many on both sides of the last mandate of masking being lifted. After the "freedom convoy" protests that took over downtown Ottawa streets for three weeks and cost the city tens of millions of dollars, to lift mandates and now an election on the horizon in June, many say lifting all the mandates early is a political move. So... while we are ready to open up a little more than we have before, we are still going to be careful. We are thankful for our vaccines. The good news is that spring is on its way and that means more outdoor gatherings with more fresh air. I think we will continue to be cautious but we hope to do a little more in the month ahead. This week I stopped washing all groceries and went back to just washing fresh produce. I can't believe the amount of time that saves to just put groceries away without washing everything. We have lowered our quarantining of items brought into the house to one week for things we feel unsure about instead of the 28 days we were doing. There are only a few items that we do this for now like, for example, library books.
I feel like that will go soon. Still...I want to see what happens two weeks after March Break with people allowed to go anywhere they want.
I am ready to slowly work towards adding more outings back into our lives. I see the light.
Currently Vladimir Putin (Russia) thought it was a good time to take control of Ukraine and overthrow its democratically elected government. People have died and lots are fleeing. It is dangerous and sad. The world feels this war. Families are broken apart, but this war needs to be carefully handled between NATO and Russia. So far...there is no light at the end of that tunnel. My heart aches for those in this war.
I have to believe that there is good out there. Things will get better. We press on. One day at a time.