“Until the day when God shall deign to reveal the future to man, all human wisdom is summed up in these two words,-Wait and hope.”
Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
We are on day 218 of 15 days to slow the spread.
Edmond Dantès was in prison for fourteen years.
So roughly, same.
Dantès didn’t have Netflix to distract him, or bore him as the case may be. Instead he had a mad priest who taught him for years and who told him of a hidden fortune.
Dantès then spent years seeking revenge on those who had wronged him.
I’m not learning much from Netflix or any of the other streaming services we have.
I don’t know any mad priests.
I have known a few off kilter preachers in my lifetime, but that’s another post. Or actually a few chapters in the book. Or books.
And unless Publishers Clearing House keeps their promise to show up at my house, I’m also without a great fortune.
Back some 47 years ago when we were all placed under house arrest, I decided it would be a great time to get things done.
Lose some weight. Finish the novel. Finish a graphic design project. Get the yard under control.
But the longer we were locked away, the more obvious it was that these things weren’t going to happen.
I can report that I’ve dismissed the weight I gained in the three months before the gym reopened.
And, as you read earlier this week, I’ve rearranged my home office three times.
I am hoping that the current unknown whereabouts of a much needed script do not require another rearrangement.
We’ve done a lot of waiting for things to open back up.
A lot of waiting.
Sometimes it seems like there’s not much hope.
But, we will get through this.
Most of us have learned to adapt. It will be weird when we’re finally released and things start to go back to normal.
Whatever normal is.
I have no idea how much longer we’ll be locked up.
I’m not skeptical enough to say that it will all be over on November 4.
I am observant enough to say that a lot of these restrictions are political.
You know that to be true.
We’re coming up on the holiday season.
We go right from Halloween to Thanksgiving to Christmas.
And this year, we don’t get the usual distractions of Charlie Brown on network TV. You’ll have to go to your DVD or to certain streaming options.
We don’t get parades.
Here at the house, we’re simplifying the decorating process. Holiday company will be at a minimum.
Maybe, just maybe without the distractions and the usual holiday anxiety, we can stop and remember what the Christmas season is about.
That’s where the hope comes from.
Photo by Zac Durant on Unsplash
What I’m reading…