China, Thailand, Vietnam, Indiana, Ohio, Minnesota, and back to Indiana. We are displaced and out of our routine, but well... because I know you were dying to know:) We were in China when COVID-19 had an earlier name, and when Wuhan had quarantined off its 11 million people. We remember our school under lockdown in China and what that meant for our life-situation, there. On-campus, people who had traveled, some through Wuhan, were returning to campus and were told to quarantine and wear masks. The most impressive of reasons for our leaving Sias on Feb 10 - well into our third week of lockdowns - stemmed from our western colleagues' absolute contempt for these new regulations... and how that unnecessarily jeopardized the well-being of our friends and loved ones, there. So we booked tickets to Thailand, because they were cheap and because we thought this was the best situation for our family, given this context.
Then things went from bad to worse. Squabbles over what to name the virus became a thing. Italy, Iran, and Korea were early to have significant outbreaks and then the US, too, experienced a major uptick in coronavirus cases. Our Sias admin assured us, even still, that the whole thing was blown out of proportion, China had safeguarded the spread, and we were going to need to return to campus late Feb, then early March, then late March, and then... we ran out of time on our visas. So we purchased $20 tickets for Vietnam, still being assured that returning to China was going to be required. The coronavirus moved in status from epidemic to pandemic while we were in Vietnam and her infections quadrupled. This caused a relative panic that translated into lockdowns, there. Pompeo issued a level four emergency and we got tickets back to the States, finally calling off returning as an option for the semester. We quarantined in Indiana and a month later made our way to Minnesota, we are now back in Indy trying to keep up with it all.
Amazingly, we are back in the house Holly and I moved to after we got married:) and have memories here that are both precious and painful, much like those important to this journey... out of one fire and into another, as it were. Indiana's numbers are increasing daily and the trend looks all too familiar. With all this political noise about our government making us all do something, they don't have the right to make us do, and the attempt to make this, too, about State's rights... the hubris, in these arguments, is overwhelming. We've chosen to wear our masks on the regular since January. It's tiring and I don't like it all the time, but "for the least of these", right? I'm grateful, I guess, that the choice is one I have the right to make... Perhaps if we were ordered not to, that might change things... In my view, whatever your trial or joy, we ought to act in a way that celebrates the good - for those around us... and for ourselves.
In any case, currently, we are fixing-up my parent's place, reno-ing our RV:), finishing up an engine swap, finding supplemental-income-buy-and-sell projects, finishing my Sias responsibilities for the semester, and trying to make the most of what we have... God be praised! I don't mean to blame him for our acquisitions... just to celebrate the life that is ours to live and thank him for the courage to live it. Love to all yours!
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