Happy Holidays

I’m on schedule to miss Thanksgiving and Christmas with my family. Too much risk for these old bones. I’m sure I’ll be argued with, and there’s probably some sort of risk aversion analysis to prove I’m being overly cautious, but I’d rather hear Ruthie Foster sing about when death comes knocking than actually have it happen, especially when I might have some control over it. Ah, the times in which we live.

Of course, I’ve missed family holidays on two other occasions. Back in 1967 and ’68 I got to spend them with close friends at the Charleston Naval Station and then the Marine barracks at Quantico, Virginia. I remember very little about those two holidays. They were just days that passed. The thing for which I was most grateful, at the time, was that no one was shooting at me. I counted that as a sincere blessing. For instance, the Charleston Christmas was followed in January by the Tet offensive, which sort of rocked everyone’s world.

Now, here we are. Under attack by a virus and it’s under the wire and in the camp. Luckily, I’m in a position where sitting still is very much an option, and in fact, recommended as a means of avoiding getting sick. I’ve pretty much availed myself to that approach since this started, although I was out and about a bit during the warm months. Now that cooler weather is here, however, and virus survival conditions have improved, I’m going to turtle up. I like fire, but it’s not something with which I play. And luckily, I never had to have my heart race to feel alive, because somewhere along the way, I learned the art of waiting.