Interruptions of My Calm

 This last week has been full of interruptions disrupting my sought after state of calmness.   Big and little things have happened.  Yesterday, Bob and I drove down to Fremont to get our 2nd Covid vaccination.  The site was more crowded this time.  There was a 30 minute wait in a line.  The place seemed to be crackling with energy.  Everybody was so happy to get their shots!!!!  We toasted each other last night about our closer end of Covid fear.  Neither one of us had any reaction to the shot, so that is great.  In every group of which I’m a part, “did you get your shot yet” is certainly the major topic of conversation.  I’m happy to report, most everyone has gotten at least one.  So Biden’s  goal of 100 million shots in his first 100 days seems to be possible.  

Our elderly neighbor across the street has moved out, probably to a nursing home or maybe she died.  I don’t know.  There is no light in the evening and the front curtains don’t open and close as they have done for years. She was a sweet lady, though very reserved.  We barely ever even spoke in the 40 plus years we’ve lived here.  Once in 1989 they offered to let Arne and me stay in their home for a few days.  We had a few days to wait before our flight after our renters arrived and they were gone on a trip.  It was extremely nice of them.  I remember they had heated floors.  We would be joining Bob on his Humboldt Fellowship in Germany.  It was Arne’s freshman year in high school so Arne and I stayed in Berkeley for his first semester.  Bob and Erik had been over there since September.  He spent his 2nd semester in Heidelberg which had its definite pluses and minuses.  Now there are painters painting the outside of the house across the street.  It’s sad as she and her husband built the house and lived there since the early 1950’s.   I wonder if we’ll have new neighbors there soon.  

And finally the second impeachment trial of trump is underway.  As historian Heather Cox Richardson said “ the people really on trial are the 50 Republican Senators judging trump’s guilt.”  I wonder if he will continue to be the center of the Republican Party with his big lie.  If he is acquitted, he’ll be back in politics, that’s for sure.  Can our democracy survive with just one rational political party?  It is a big question. 

All this and the February spring blossoms are bursting forth in Berkeley.  On our walks, there are bright yellow daffodils nodding in the sunshine; amazing hellebores with their heavy blossoms bent over; plum and cherry trees becoming covered in pink blossoms.  February is the most amazing month here in Berkeley.