Keyes Chronicles

May 23, 2020

March 12th, 2020; the day the world changed.

It was my birthday. I was turning the big 35. My husband had an appointment scheduled in the city, Edmonton, to have an MRI done on his shoulder which he dislocated approximately a year ago, to the day, in an epic hike in Goldstrike Canyon, near Lake Mead, Nevada. But that's a whole other story. One filled with pain, lots of pain, a hiking doctor attempting to relocated the shoulder, no success, a girl with a phone recording the whole thing (it's probably on YouTube somewhere, I have yet to find it), emergency evacuations, missing flights, etc, etc. You can read about it on a prior post. But I digress, back to my birthday.

With the appointment planned on my birthday, he thought it would be a good enough reason to take the day off work and spend it with me. We arranged for Honey Badger to be watched by The Uncle Ben (he is very famous in the eyes of these scallywags), and the older boy, our Non-so-Little Dragon had a play date with a friend after school, thus buying us time together until after dinner.

Prior to March 12, 2020, I had heard about this little thing called COVID-19. It was mentioning time to time on the news and to me, was far-far away in a place called China. I even, now regrettably, joked about it on a kindergarten picture, I think late January, on Honey Badger's school app. A child was playing doctor on another child and I, now regrettably, said something to the effect of, "Oh no the child has COVID", thinking that this couldn't ever possibly be reaching our side of the world. Thankfully, the teacher filters the comments before making them public and had the foresight, even then, not to make my comment visible to the other parents.

Now on Thursday, March 12, 2020... this little virus was making it's way into my world and not in a lighthearted, funny sort of way. Not cool COVID. We started the day hearing about cruise ships not being allowed to dock anywhere. That on the ship, the majority of the passengers were experiencing symptoms and were just stuck on the floating thing indefinably. Symptoms of: ache, tiredness, coughing, fever, and difficulty breathing. I remember earlier that week, being at Not-so-Little Dragon's hockey practicing and hearing a nurse and a lab tech talk about it. "Oh it's just the flu" I kept hearing back and forth between them. I kept my murderino/worst case ideas to myself. I knew that it wasn't just the flu.

For my birthday, I had planned to go into the city and spend some time shopping. Hitting up West Edmonton Mall early in the day, before it got busy and then going to South Common and some thrift stores. The perfect thing to do on my birthday without any of my little sons. Hearing about all of this virus stuff gave me an idea, a challenge so to speak. I had it in my mind that for my birthday I was going to buy hand sanitizer, kind of as a gag, but also may prove as a practical gift in the coming weeks.

Driving into the city, on the radio, we heard about the cruise ships. Walking around West Edmonton Mall, heading to Bath and Body Works I kept thinking... what's the difference between a giant cruise ship that circulates air and has a ton of occupants and a giant mall? Nothing. I quickly went to Bath and Body Works and was greeted by half a dozen people. There customer service goes overboard and I really hate it. If I don't ask you a question and am avoiding eye contact, it's because I don't want to talk to you. I head to the back of the store, by the cashiers to look for my Holy Grail, the hand sanitizer section. Nothing. Completely empty. I turn around and ask the 7th person working in the store, who was just about to ask me if I needed any help or even a basket, about this lack of sanitizer. "The whole city is out," she told me. I smile and probably said something like, "Great..." and quickly exit the store. Calling Big Dragon on my phone, my anxiety is starting to get a bit higher, "What's the difference between this mall and a cruise ship?" I quiz him and leave the mall to the van. He meets me there a bit after with a box of cinnamon buns. If there is one thing you should know about Big Dragon is that he is a sucker for CinnZeo.

I drive Big Dragon to his appointment and we hear breaking news, the National Baseball League is cancelling further games, so is the NBA.. and Sophia Trudeua, the freaking Prime Minister's wife, has tested positive for COVID-19 after returning from a trip to England. No WAY!!!

We look at each other and process this information. It's here. It's in Canada now. An unknown virus, that has been killing people over 70 and many others with underlying illness was now here. And on top of that, there is no cure, no treatment and no vaccine. Great...

Did that completely stop my day? No. Did I still go thrifting? Yes. Did we still go out for lunch at the Crepiere? Yes. But, was I paranoid the whole day? Heck, YES! Did the lunch out together feel sort of like an eerie, last meal out? You bet.

The most surreal thing about that day was hearing that our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, made a worldwide announcement saying that all public services would be cancelled. This is a church, like many fundamental faiths, that never closes. It's a church where if you drive your family in a storming blizzard to church, you were faithful and would be blessed for it. Not like those other faithless family's who decided not to risk their lives and stayed home. It's a church where if you a miss a week, you have to somehow report and justify your absence. So and so was sick, or we were away. Kind of like the saying, misery loves company. People who are at church always need to know why they are there and you aren't. If they have to suffer through boring sermons or leaders grand-standing, while silencing their children into reverence, why the heck did you get a free-pass for Sabbath?

Again, I digress. I have a complicated relationship with my faith. Anyways- the church is cancelling public services people! The. Church. Could this be motivated by potential lawsuits? Sure. But they were indeed taking the virus seriously at an early stage in the game.

Out of all of the events and news worthy things happening that day, this was the one that stood out the most to me. We could worship at home and take care of our spiritual needs as a family unit. Perfect!

We made it home. Hearing that in Ontario there was talk that they would be closing schools for two weeks after Spring Break. I remember at one store, the clerk rolled her eyes at that, thinking, "Just like Ontario to do something like that. Alberta isn't that reactionary." Ha ha. Wrong sucker!!

Little Dragon and Honey Badger went to school the next day, Friday March 13th. I remember picking up Honey Badger and trying to hurry him out the door to the van. "Just a second" he said and ran towards his friend, saying goodbye and giving him a big ol' hug. I remember thinking, that's how germs get spread. Looking back at this moment, right now, it really touches me; how after over 2 months of schools being closed and on-line schooling being the current method of instruction, these little ones missing the play, the touch, and the hugs. That's how they learn and communicate at this stage.

Instead of driving out to Barrhead for sacrament meeting, on Sunday March 15th, we held our own little service at our home and then being rebels drove into St Albert to see the movie, Onward. I had a feeling that we should go see one more movie, one last time. Landmark Cinemas only allowed people to view movies at 50% of the capacity. I brought Lysol wipes and cleaned our chairs before sitting on them. The man sitting on the row directly behind us rolled his eyes so loud at my OCD actions, but I didn't care. This was our one last family outing to a movie theater until....

Onward is a Pixar movie, that is now out on Disney + about adventure and loss and most importantly, brotherly love. We all loved it.

Now we move onward, navigating through COVID-19. I hope for the best. But I also had a dream about Canada being overthrown by China and all democracy was lost. Debbie Downer much, right? Hopefully, that only stays a really, really weird dream. But I don't think I could have even dreamed up this global pandemic.