 Crazy dances added to the roar of the 1920s. Here Norwegian pole vault champion, Charles Hoff, and Tempest Stevens are shown in a Charleston contest. Photo: Bettmann/Getty Images “Debauchery!” said my sister-in-law Deb in our last Zoom call. “I just read that things won’t get back to normal until 2024 and then we’ll have a wild period of debauchery!” These days everybody’s got a theory about how things will look “when all this is over.” Some financial types say this decade will mark the end of the world economy — “driving the last nail into the coffin of the globalists,” as one put it. Psychologists fear many of us will never hug, shake hands, or even leave our homes again. Inspired by predictions that das volk will continue avoiding bars, a German publication announced “the end of the night.” Some sociologists suggest young people will no longer engage in casual sex. Malarkey, applesauce, and horsefeathers, say I. Clearly these prognosticators have forgotten about a little thing I like to call “human nature.” People always have — and always will — strive to make a buck, seek congenial places to raise a glass, and find opportunities to fool around. That’s why the debauchery prediction actually made sense to me. I tracked down the author, who turned out to be Dr. Nicholas Christakis, an esteemed Harvard-educated social scientist and physician who is running Yale’s Human Nature Lab. One of his areas of expertise is how our behaviors influence contagion in society. As you can imagine, his thoughts are in hot demand these days.  “Many people seem to think it’s the actions of our government that are causing the economy to slow – that’s false,” says Dr. Nicholas Christakis. “It’s the virus that’s causing the economy to slow, because economies collapsed even in ancient times when plagues happened, even when there was no government saying close the schools and close the restaurants.” “Plagues are not new to our species — they’re just new to us,” observes Christakis. “During epidemics you get increases in religiosity, people become more abstentious, they save money, they get risk averse, and we’re seeing all of that now — just as we have for hundreds of years during epidemics.” The biggest difference this time around? “We’re the first generation of humans alive who has ever faced this threat that [can] respond in real-time with efficacious medicines. It’s miraculous.” He suggests vaccination will take all of 2021, and we’ll need the next two years to recover from the socioeconomic devastation left in the pandemic’s wake. And then? Look out, world! Christakis predicts “another Roaring Twenties” like the one that followed the 1918 flu pandemic. When it comes to eras, the original Roaring Twenties was, as they said back then, the “gnat’s eyebrows.” Having survived the twin traumas of World War I and the flu pandemic, our nation enjoyed a booming economy and was ready to release its pent-up desire to make whoopee. Women, energized by winning the right to vote, were busy breaking taboos: bobbing their hair, smoking cigarettes, wearing dresses that (gasp!) bared the knee, and getting fitted for (I blush to mention it) diaphragms for birth control. African Americans introduced the world to thrilling new music that gave the era its other name: the Jazz Age. Prohibition tried to put a lid on things, so public-spirited members of the underworld quickly set up speakeasies to provide enough giggle water to keep everyone zozzled. The economy doubled in just nine years, and with so much extra voot jingling in their pockets, people bought radios — creating mass communication, the advertising industry, and modern consumerism. Egged on by radio sponsors, everyone spent as never before on stuff they’d never heard of and often didn’t need. And we’ve never stopped. One of the hottest controversies in the “when all this is over” debate is whether or not we’ll revert to the cycle of compulsive consumption that Madison Avenue has spent a century programming us to believe is not just normal but our patriotic duty and one of life’s great pleasures.  Black Friday. Enough said. “The mutation of shopping from buying necessary stuff to being a leisure activity — “retail therapy” — has been one of the most miserable cons of modern life,” writes Guardian columnist Suzanne Moore. “If anything good has come out of this awful time, it is this … a pause in mindless consumption. ‘When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping,’ they used to say. Well, it’s no longer true, if it ever was.” “If all this consumption was making us deliriously happy that would be one thing,” points out Harvard economist Juliet B. Schor. “But in fact what we find is after intense desires to acquire goods, Americans are discarding them at record rates.” How much stuff are we throwing away? Pre-pandemic it was about 300 million tons a year — 4.5 pounds per person per day. Top discards included food (30.63 million tons), plastic (26.82 million tons) and a little further down the list, textiles including clothing (11.5 million tons). I was aghast to learn that while sheltering in place we’ve been generating 25% more trash.  Designer Marina Hamm is proud that her company, Volcom, makes swimsuits out of old fishing nets and used carpets. It's a step in the right direction, but that swimsuit is still likely to end up in a landfill soon. All this raises a moral dilemma. I’ve spent decades trying to be a responsible steward of the planet and doing my share of reducing, reusing, and recycling. Back in Ohio I organized our town’s curbside recycling program and Earth Day activities, and nowadays I write a weekly column on climate change for a Seville-based publication. But I live in the real world with conflicting priorities and tough choices. While I flinch at the thought of the amount of Amazon packaging flowing in and out of my house, my pandemic survival strategy involves doing as little in-person shopping as possible. I am well aware that 80% of the people who have died of Covid-19 are in my 65+ age group. Rich, who is 76, has a mortality risk factor 220 times higher than that of young people. I am doing everything I can to keep us both safe. On that front, I have some exciting news: Rich received his first dose of the vaccine. Last Friday he went to the Marin County Fairgrounds, and after a lengthy, chilly wait to get into the main hall, he breezed through the vaccination in twenty minutes. The shot was so painless the nurse had to tell him it was over and he should 23 skidoo. When will I be inoculated? Theoretically soon, but shortages mean they’re delaying my age group a bit longer. Fingers crossed they have enough around for Rich’s second shot in a few weeks. The uncertainty is frustrating, but we feel lucky compared to our European friends, who don’t expect to be vaccinated until September, or possibly December.  Rich shows off his vaccination card and sticker. Christakis may be right that the pandemic and its aftermath won’t subside until 2024. Or it could be pure banana oil. Who knows? As humorist James Thurber wrote, “The past is an old armchair in the attic, the present an ominous ticking sound, and the future is anybody's guess.” But here’s hoping that by 2024 the world is safe enough for us all to indulge in a bit of fun — if not outright debauchery, then a little lighthearted, distance-free socializing, when it’s finally safe to don our glad rags, fire up the flivver, and round up congenial pals for a night of putting on the Ritz.  I still have this dress, which I wore in 1991 to this 1920s theme murder mystery party. Before that it was my wedding dress. I'm looking forward to wearing it again in 2024. This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic, if possible with some of our sanity and sense of humor intact. Each week I provide tips, strategies, and reasons for hope. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week. Feel free to share this post link with family and friends. https://www.enjoylivingabroad.com/my-blog/is-roaring-20s-style-debauchery-just-around-the-corner YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY
11 Comments
 "Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase," said Martin Luther King, Jr. The same goes for rickety bridges, like this one I crossed in Thailand in 1992. “The best thing I learned from our travels,” Rich remarked over Sunday lunch, “was how to live with uncertainty.” Even the most carefully planned journey holds some suspense, if only about the weather and the sheer happenstance of daily living. One January in our corporate days, Rich and I took the chairman of the board and his wife on a business trip to a luxury hotel, certain they’d love it. The heating system in their room went on the fritz, so they passed the night in shivering misery and, no doubt, cursing our names. It was even chillier in the hostel where Rich and I stayed during our visit to Veliko Tarnovo, high in the Bulgarian mountains, in the autumn of 2013. But we loved every minute of it. When you pay $28 a night, you don’t expect much. And yes, our private room had a notable lack of scattered rose petals, chocolates on the pillow, hand towels folded to look like swans — or, for that matter, heat. But the dining hall was toasty warm all day, and the communal breakfasts and dinners offered riveting conversations that Rich and I still talk about to this day.  Our private room in the Hostel Mostel, Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria came with five thick wool blankets. We piled them on, and they were so heavy I could hardly turn over in the night. My point is that expectations shape how we view all experiences. As Americans, we’re brought up with the unspoken but pervasive belief that if we do everything right we can plant our feet on solid ground and count on a life that’s perfectly secure, permanently comfortable, and filled with our fair share of pleasures. That’s always been a pipe dream. “Our lives are written in disappearing ink,” said author Michelle Cliff. The pandemic has made that obvious in ways we can’t ignore. Never have so many been so uncertain about so much for so long. If we’ve got any hope of maintaining our sanity through all this, we need to find a way to embrace uncertainty. And the best way to do that, the Buddhists suggest, is to think less about the past and future, and focus on the present moment. Now, you may be thinking: “But the present moment is so boring!” Which brings us to the second thing travel can teach us: how to cope with boredom.  Our understanding of boredom is largely cultural. To the Frenchwoman above, it’s ennui, a sort of languid, jaded world-weariness. The Germans identify it straightforwardly as langeweile, a long time. Russians call it skuka after the sound of clucking chickens. In Nigeria young men speak of zaman kashin wando, sitting so long you wear out your pants. The concept of boredom is a modern invention, arising when the Industrial Revolution and train schedules suddenly required everyone to live by the clock. Identifying work hours created the idea of spare time — and pressure to maximize it before the next shift started. Australian anthropologist Yasmine Musharbash, who studies boredom in indigenous populations, says, “Traditionally, and by that, I mean pre-colonization, there would not have been such a thing as boredom. Boredom is when you rub up against time. That just would not have happened before. Because of colonization and how the day is structured — school bells, work times — time becomes a straitjacket.” In Western society, she says, it starts when we’re babies. “Bedtime trains us for work and makes us good workers. We learn that certain things need to be done at certain times. It is a pretty brutal lesson, but it is a way of accepting that time is the boss of you.” One of the hardest adjustments of the pandemic is losing the structure that has ruled our daily lives since infancy. For some, time seems to stretch out in a seamless eternity of sameness. Others are caught up in the frenzy of working from home while overseeing the kids’ online studies and doing the astonishing amount of cooking required to put three meals on the table seven days a week. Circumstances vary, but we’ve all lost the familiar routines that once governed our days. Much as we do when we travel.  Routine goes out the window when we begin to travel. After a while, our days take on new patterns. While relaxing the timetable can bring a sense of freedom, I’ve learned completely unstructured days leave me feeling adrift. On the road and at home, Rich and I establish routines that give rhythm to our day. We set aside hours for working online: doing research, keeping up with emails, and (in my case) writing my blog posts. During this time, we give each other plenty of psychological space. Even when working elbow-to-elbow at the kitchen table of a tiny Airbnb, we rarely interrupt each other, knowing that having some private headspace is vital to our sanity. It takes a lot for one of us to violate this code. One of the few times it’s happened, during a long-ago emergency in Ohio, I didn’t respond well. I should have known Rich would have a good reason for bursting into my office, but I didn’t even look up from the screen as I snapped, “I don’t care if the house is on fire. I have to finish this.” “Okay,” he said. “I just thought you might want to know there’s a six-foot snake on our bed.”  Rich removing the snake from the pillowcase before releasing it into the wild. In the pandemonium that followed, the snake slithered into a heating vent, and eventually a policeman helped Rich grab the wily reptile and stuff it into a pillow case. As Rich and I drove off to release it into the wild, the pillow case started to move. I thought Rich was jiggling it in jest. Then the snake’s head shot up out of the opening, and it began biting him on the hand — so hard its fangs snapped off. Luckily it was just a harmless black rat snake. We kept the fangs in a glass jar for years to impress the neighborhood kids. OK, I know I must have had some reason for telling the snake story . . . Oh yes, coping strategies. Living in the present moment helps, as does establishing some kind of routine. My third suggestion is about acceptance. Take shortages, for instance. My supermarket is often completely out of toilet paper, no longer carries my favorite crackers, and sells only canned artichoke hearts too fibrous to chew. Small annoyances, I agree, but still.  No matter how often it happens, I always find it disconcerting to arrive at the paper products aisle of a major supermarket and see empty shelves. Big chain stores and online shopping have trained us to expect a vast array of options at low prices with a money-back guarantee. Traveling abroad, I’ve learned to choose from among a few off-brand products that are only very approximately what I want. The silver lining? Having fewer choices actually makes us happier, according to research by psychologist Barry Schwartz. Constantly seeking maximum satisfaction can turn people into discontented perfectionists, while those who accept the first available option that meets their criteria tend to be happier with their purchase. As disconcerting as it is to see near-empty shelves, snapping up one of three remaining rolls of paper towels is positively thrilling. We’re all struggling to reconstruct our disrupted lives while wondering about the future. Whenever I contemplate the long term effects of the pandemic, I remember a Buddhist lecturer who said that when the Dalai Lama was asked about the legacy of the French Revolution. he replied, “Oh, it’s much too soon to say.” Yes, we live in an age of profound uncertainty with unknown consequences. But then, doesn’t everyone? This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic, if possible with some of our sanity and sense of humor intact. Each week I provide tips, strategies, and reasons for hope. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week. Feel free to share Three Ways Travel Prepares Us for Pandemic Survival with family and friends. https://www.enjoylivingabroad.com/my-blog/three-ways-travel-prepares-us-for-pandemic-suvival YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY  My digital nomad friends Lindsay and Ross have held online jobs and lived all over the world since 2008. After the earthquake last Saturday night, as soon as the couch stopped shaking, I turned to Rich and said, “So it’s true. Mother Earth really is trying to kill us.” It wasn’t Her best effort; a mere 4.2 on the Richter scale, just enough to startle. By the time I realized it might be wise to dive under the furniture, it was all over. The previous quake, which struck on December 31st — a little parting gift from our old pal, 2020 — was even weaker, but with the epicenter just a few miles away, that one bounced me like a trampoline. Ah, the joys of living in California.  Like all California kids, I grew up preparing for earthquakes. It’s been pretty wild around here lately, but with the state’s Covid numbers (finally!) dropping a bit and vaccines on the way (yes, they are!), there’s room for optimism. For months, those vaccines were like Bigfoot — the stuff of legend without any reliable sightings. Now a few people I know have received their shots, including someone who joined a high-priced concierge medical service to get one, and a veteran who's flying to a military base that's doing inoculations. “Do we have to up our game?” I say to Rich whenever we hear such stories. “Bribe or hustle our way into line?” I don’t mind waiting behind nursing home residents and essential workers but hate to be outdone by the rich and crafty.  Pharmacies are inundated with requests for information, tests, and vaccines they don't have. “I think things are about to get better,” Rich said yesterday, and sent me the NY Times story, “Biden’s Covid-19 Plan Is Maddeningly Obvious.” The real shocker, says the article, is that these no-brainer solutions weren’t in place months ago: “Loosen the restrictions on who can get vaccinated (and when). Set up many more sites where vaccinations can take place. Mobilize more medical personnel to deliver the vaccinations. And use the might of the federal government to increase the vaccine supply by manufacturing whatever is needed, whenever it is needed, to accelerate the effort.” Amen to all that! The plan calls for FEMA to set up vaccination sites in gyms, sports stadiums, community centers, and mobile units. “They’re evaluating how to eke out more doses from the existing supply — there is, for instance, a particular syringe that will get you six doses out of a given quantity of Pfizer’s vaccine rather than five, and they are looking at whether the Defense Production Act could accelerate production of that particular syringe and other, similarly useful goods.” Reading those plans gave me a first flicker of hope that we might actually be on the verge of moving past this phase of our lives into a — dare I say it? — post-pandemic world.  What will it be like the day we finally put away our masks for good? Photo by Getty Naturally everyone’s speculating madly about what the future will look like, and the only thing they all agree on is that we won't return to pre-Covid normal. For a start, many of the 100 million Americans now working from home will keep doing so in 2021, possibly forever. And that, my friends, is the sound of opportunity knocking. As many of my expat pals have learned, working remotely means you can live anywhere, moving on whenever you’re ready for a change of scenery. For those fed up with staring at the same four walls and the same old view out the window, that’s a heady idea. Just think about becoming a digital nomad, working remotely in another part of the US. Or even more excitingly, doing your job from abroad, which just got a lot easier thanks to new digital nomad visas designed to attract working visitors as soon as travel restrictions are lifted. “Portugal, as of February 1st, 2021 will take the most significant leap yet, with the islands of Madeira embracing nomads with their very own village,” observes travel writer Gilbert Ott. “Ponta Do Sol will become the first pilot project village aiming to create a symbiotic relationship between locals and digital nomads, who are actively being encouraged to visit.” Before you start downloading Portuguese language tapes, take a moment to consider some of the other places waiting with open arms. I’ve compiled a list (you’ll find it below), but before we get to that, let me fill you in on how it works. The digital nomad idea became practical around 2008, when advances in internet and cell phone services made it possible to interact seamlessly with clients and employers thousands of miles away. That’s when my friends Lindsay and Ross, Americans working in Seville, found online jobs through Craigslist and decided to make their home in the larger world. “We threw all the chips in and bet everything on this decision,” Ross told me. They reduced their entire worldly goods to two suitcases, a small roll-aboard, a backpack, Ross’s guitar, and their dog, Rocky. Strict travel protocols were developed; if one of them bought a t-shirt, they had to get rid of t-shirt; no extras allowed. Like most young couples, they lived in modest rented apartments and worked hard five days a week. But when they walked outside after hours, they were always someplace new and exciting. “It’s really not a question of why we do it,” said Lindsay. “It’s more a question of why doesn’t everyone do it?” This year we’re seeing another giant leap forward in the digital nomad lifestyle. Until now, most traveled under tourist visas, which usually limit the stay to 90 days and prohibit working. But now (drumroll, please!) more than a dozen countries are offering some version of digital nomad visas, which allow you to stay a year or more while you continue doing your job from, say, an apartment in Greece or beach house Costa Rica. The amount of paperwork varies considerably, as does the application fee, which can be a modest $100 or run as high as $2000 for an individual, $3000 for a family. In some cases, you may be asked to demonstrate you’re actually employed or a business owner, not just a vacationer looking for excellent wifi and other perks— such as the access to healthcare, telecom, utilities, and all the other benefits offered by Dubai. So what countries offer some version of the digital nomad visa? Barbados Bermuda Cayman Islands Costa Rica Czech Republic Dubai Estonia Germany Greece Mexico Norway Portugal Republic of Georgia Rich and I have visited most of these countries, and there's no question they can be a lot of fun. Sensibly, most countries won’t allow Americans to enter until we get our pandemic numbers under control. But hey, that just means you have sufficient time to consider whether the digital nomad lifestyle is for you. Not up for living abroad? If you’re working remotely, retired, or otherwise untethered to a specific geographic area, this may be the year to explore new horizons nearer home. A recent study showed that when you’re on the fence about a major life decision, choosing to make a change is overwhelming more satisfying than clinging to the status quo. Actress Goldie Hawn said, “We have to embrace obstacles to reach the next stage of joy.” I think we’ve all embraced more than our fair share of obstacles lately. Is it finally time to think about getting out there — whenever it's safe — and embracing a little joy?  Erge and Martin, our Airbnb hosts in Tallinn, Estonia, filled our time there with joy and laughter. YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY
This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic and (if we're lucky) beginning the transition to a post-Covid world. Each week I provide tips, strategies, comfort food recipes, and reasons for hope. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week. Feel free to share this Digital Nomad Visas post with family and friends. https://www.enjoylivingabroad.com/my-blog/working-remotely-why-not-do-it-overseas-with-one-of-the-new-digital-nomad-visas  Lenny was just a house pet until, like so many of us, he got into cooking during quarantine. OK, 2021, the hour of reckoning has come. Yes, already! You can't deny we performed all the proper rituals — red underwear, grapes, buckets of water out the door, 360 million glasses of champaign in the US alone. Frankly, we gave you the most enthusiastic welcome of any year in the history of time. What did we ask in return? Just a little relief from the chaos and madness of past twelve months. But no, you couldn’t resist the opportunity to outdo 2020. You just had to start off the very first week with an insurrection designed to derail American democracy. What’s next? No, don’t tell me. I’m not sure my nerves can take it. So much for my foolish notion that 2021 would be better than its predecessor. I was preparing to write this year off as a total washout (why wait until the last minute?) but then I paused to reflect on some inspiring stories that have already come out of it. Stories of those who are finding ways to stay engaged in the world in spite of everything. For instance, I’m still basking in the sheer delight of my latest discovery: a lizard (specifically a bearded dragon) who has published his own cookbook, Chef Lenny: Cooking for Humans. True story; I couldn’t make this stuff up. “It was my quarantine project,” says Valerie Musser, Lenny’s owner, ghost writer, and publicist. When her catering business was derailed by the pandemic, she began writing a long-postponed cookbook and amused herself posting Instagram photos of Lenny in a miniature chef’s hat she found on Etsy. “He actually loves wearing hats and posing for photos, so I started making miniature food for him to show off with.” Moreover, Lenny has a classic chef’s temperament. “He is very pretentious. His body language is kind of crazy, he wants what he wants, he’s very demanding and he’s kind of a snob about food, very fussy, so this project fits him very well.” Lenny isn’t the only unexpected new celebrity. Fans of fungi will be pleased to know the once-humble mushroom has had series of makeovers and is now popping up everywhere. Adidas’ line of “vegan footwear” includes sneakers made of “mushroom-based leather” derived from the fast-growing roots known as mycelium. A Stanford designer is growing mushrooms on a diet of sawdust and using their mycelium to make bricks that are said to be “stronger than concrete.” And never worry that demand will outstrip the supply, because a Dutch inventor has created a coffin that turns bodies into mushrooms. It takes just a single week to create a “living cocoon” by growing mycelium around a box-shaped frame with an open bottom. When the time comes, you just lay your loved one to rest inside, and he or she will spend the next few years decomposing gracefully back into the earth, adding nutrients to the soil. Not surprisingly, getting this product to market will require overcoming some serious legal hurdles and the creepiness factor. If only Tales from the Crypt was still around to serve as the sponsor. In the constellation of new superstars, perhaps the most astounding virtuoso is Secret, a young Australian shepherd who’s become an adept practitioner of doga, or dog yoga. When not mastering complex asanas (yoga poses), Secret enjoys spending time with his human, Mary Peters, painting, doing housework, and learning CPR. Another creature-human relationship that’s taken the quarantined world by storm is the heartwarming platonic romance between Craig Foster and a female octopus living in the kelp forest of South Africa’s Cape of Storms. “What Charlotte’s Web did in the popular imagination for the humble, much-maligned barn spider, My Octopus Teacher sets out to achieve for the eight-limbed mollusc of its title,” says Variety in a review titled “An Eight-Legged Freak Becomes a Friend in Netflix’s Gorgeous Hit Nature Doc.” The film is sensitive, intelligent, and mind-expanding, so naturally somebody had to do a goofy parody. Filmmakers rose to the challenge with My Kreepy Teacher, the story of a man bonding with his Kreepy Krauly-brand pool cleaner.  Can you tell which is the real octopus and which is the pool cleaner? With the possible exception of the dog Secret, relationships with members of other species (let alone inanimate objects like the Kreepy Krauly pool cleaner) are severely limited by physical, verbal, and social differences. Despite all its complications, we are hard wired to need human companionship. During a recent Zoom call, my sister Kate remarked that on top of everything else, we hardly ever get to meet new people these days. She’s right. Except for brief encounters with neighbors and sales clerks, I rarely speak to anyone who isn’t a relative or long-time friend. That got me thinking: How can we connect up — safely, online — with new people, preferably in a lively interactive format? One of the best ways is via Meetup, an online organizer started by New Yorkers in the wake of 9/11, when encounters with neighbors gave them a fresh appreciation of the value of human connection in dark times. It costs nothing to join; you just sign up with any group that looks interesting (like the drive-in movie group I belong to) and they send you notices of events. Nowadays everything is tailored to helping us through the pandemic, with categories such as Learn New Skills, Live Mindfully, Deepen Your Tech Knowledge, and Make Lasting Connections. There are also 3,700 board game groups and 2,500 card game groups where you can play with locals or people around the world. But what really caught my eye was Meetup’s 5,382 book clubs.  If none of these book clubs appeals, you can always check the website of your public library and local book stores, many of which host monthly online book discussions. It’s fun to think about joining one of the giants, such as the London Philosophy Club or Dharma Drink: the Hangout for Buddhists (& like minded) in New York, each of which has about 10,000 members. No doubt they break out into smaller discussion subgroups, but even so, I’d feel lost in a crowd that large. You can find smaller book clubs on Meetup or through your local public library or book store. Before joining any group, be sure to find out if they read the kind of stuff you actually like. Years ago I was flattered by an invitation to join a highbrow literary book club, where I floundered through pedantic discussions of classics I admired but didn’t enjoy one bit. As you can imagine, I hightailed it out of there as soon as possible and joined a different book club. We humans are social creatures. Our survival as individuals and as a species has always depended upon connection and cooperation. These days few of us are called upon to help the neighbors hunt a mastodon or raise a barn, but even when we’re simply partnering in a game of online Monopoly, we’re making a vital contribution to the community. Everyone needs a sense of support, the warmth of laughter, and some reassurance that we are not alone in this time of crisis. “Love and compassion,” says the Dalai Lama, “are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive.” That’s never been truer than in 2021. DEAR READERS I write these posts to contribute a little cheeriness to the general conversation, in hopes it will help us all get through these troubling times with a bit more grace and comfort. Please feel free to pass on the link to your family, friends, Zoom acquaintances, and book clubs. All are welcome here. https://www.enjoylivingabroad.com/my-blog/lets-not-give-up-on-2021-just-yet And before I close, I can't resist including one more small delight to brighten these dark days: an astonishing 3D animation from Le Petit Chef, a small country restaurant northeast of Paris. They project it onto your table while you’re waiting for dessert. Bon appétit! YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY
This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week.  Sheltering in place, many of us are finding solace in old-fashioned pastimes we have around the house. Photo by the Saint Paul Winter Carnival Puzzle Contest I no longer make New Year’s resolutions — which only 8% of people keep anyway — but this time around I’m making an exception. And I’m serious. No matter how desperate I am for something new to watch, I will not stream the movie Songbird. Haven’t heard of it? Here’s the premise: It’s the 213th week of pandemic lockdown from Covid-23. I know, right? It’s beginning to feel like that already. But wait, there’s more. A hundred and ten million people are dead, officials can test you remotely, and if you resist going to one of the squalid quarantine camps, they shoot you on sight. Being an optimist, I watched the trailer and said to Rich, “See? We don’t have it so bad!” Rotten Tomatoes gave Songbird a single star and called it “an appalling melange of insipid disaster drama and implausible romance with a bit of dystopian satire thrown in. This is a crass cash-in meant to prey on our pandemic anxieties, not grapple with them.” Yikes! So I’ve already found one thing to make me happier in 2021: avoiding Songbird. Whew! I feel I’m making progress already and we’re only a week into the year. I’m also determined to avoid impulse-buying unnecessary stuff — a pastime that gave 2020 yet another nickname: The Year of Buyer’s Remorse. Apparently panic-stockpiling toilet paper was merely the warm up; many people are now stuck with clothes they can’t wear, electronics they don’t need, even houses they can’t stand.  At a time when thousands of businesses are cutting back and going under, Amazon expanded its work force to more than 1 million people to meet the demand for online shopping. Paula Gillespie, for instance, was aghast when her husband surprised her with a camper. “The thing is too big for his truck and dangerous, and I absolutely refuse to go anywhere with it due to the dangers of it,” she said. The camper now sits idle near the fishing boat her husband bought, despite the fact they live nowhere near a boat-worthy body of water. Maureen Rashidifard’s pandemic splurges include a resistance-training apparatus, a sewing machine, a TV with a DVD player, roller skates, and a program designed to teach her kids every language on the planet. So far, nobody in the family has buffed up or learned Mandarin. As for the skates, “I fell so hard that my hat flew off my head,” she said. “I had to walk home in my socks carrying my skates, and I haven’t touched them since.”  Shopping releases dopamine, the neurotransmitter which controls pleasure inside the human brain. The pleasure is stronger during the anticipation phase than it is when you actually receive your purchase. One of the hottest commodities? Puppies, especially the easy-care, ultra-adorable breeds that make you want to spend the rest of the pandemic snuggling on the couch with your new best friend. Sales of goldendoodles — a mix of good-natured golden retriever and low-shedding poodle — are reportedly up 700%, despite the fact that top breeders charge $4000 a pup. City folks reluctant to hit the streets on a schedule suitable for a puppy’s bladder have generated a 200% rise in the demand for doggie diapers. Rich and I have resisted impulse-buying any pets, as we know it’s impractical given our plans to return to Spain when all the stars finally align. But I have to admit feeling puppy envy when I talk to my sister Kate, who recently adopted a miniature Australian shepherd. It’s her second of the breed, and while the first was a mild-mannered Clark Kent-type, this one’s a superdog called Bear who’s bursting with energy and creative ideas for enlivening lockdown.  “Why no, Dad, I haven’t seen your avocado toast. Why do you ask?” Photo by Kate Harding Speaking of food, another thing I’ll be avoiding is restaurant dining. Luckily I love to cook, especially on Sundays. In Spain, that's when families gather for late, long, leisurely lunches, and early in the pandemic, Rich and I decided to maintain this satisfying European tradition. We devote Sundays to rest and relaxation (no writing posts, jumping on the stair stepper, or even taking long hikes) so we have plenty of time to experiment with new dishes. I find I do my best work to Dean Martin singing “That’s Amore,” “Volare,” and “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head” (which I’ve nominated for the pandemic’s theme song). Thanks to Dean, I was inspired to kick off 2021 with an Italian dish: Potato and White Bean Puttanesca Soup.  This easy, heartwarming dish [see recipe here] is enlivened by a topping of capers, Kalamata olives, and fresh parsley. The recipe, now enshrined in our permanent collection, is the first — and apparently last — to be clipped from an actual copy of the NY Times. A month ago we subscribed to the Sunday edition, seeking a pastime that had the novelty of not including a screen. Week after week we received a flurry of apologies instead of the paper. Only once did a copy materialize at the end of our driveway; I can only assume there was a substitute delivery person who didn’t get the memo about the circulation department's mysterious vendetta against us. We're now resigned to the fact that subscribing to the Times is yet another activity we are destined to forego this year. Fortunately, we found an alternative pastime in the latest craze: jigsaw puzzles. Sales are booming during lockdown. “The surge in demand,” CNBC reported, “is comparable to demand during the Great Depression, according to one puzzle historian.” So puzzle historians are a thing now? Who knew? Most of the time, I find puzzles soothing and absorbing. Only rarely do I fling up my hands, exclaiming, “This one’s incomplete! Defective! There is no corner piece with a dog’s — oh wait, here it is.” Afterwards, disassembly requires the kind of spiritual strength Buddhist monks display in destroying their sand mandalas immediately upon completion. “You know the cabin puzzle we just completed?” Rich remarked at breakfast this morning. “I just saw it on Etsy, assembled and framed, for $400.” “Seriously? People buy one and — what? Pretend they did it themselves?” Hmmm, I thought. This could be a great little cottage industry for us. But then I recalled the article “How to be Happier in 2021: Toss Out Your Usual List of New Year’s Resolutions, Says Study.” Scientists pointed out that most resolutions are essentially selfish (get skinnier, richer, more productive); their research showed happiness most often arrives as a byproduct of helping others. Evidently Rich was thinking along the same lines. “I know!” he said. “When we finish, we’ll disassemble the puzzles and send them to friends as a surprise gift. Everyone’s looking for cheerful pastimes these days.” Genius! So in addition to not watching Songbird, buying skates, adopting a puppy, or reading the NY Times in hard copy, we’re won’t be hoarding puzzles. Instead, we’ll set them free to entertain other families who need a break from screen time, politics, and pandemic headlines. The payoff will be a feel-good moment each time we drop one off at the post office. We’ll know that what we’re sending forth is not just a puzzle, but a message of comfort and fellowship in dark times. Now that’s a New Year’s resolution I can get behind. What are you hoping to avoid in 2021? What new pastimes are you embracing? Please let me know in the comments section below. [See Potato and White Bean Puttanesca Soup recipe here] YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY
This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week.  Who could have predicted we'd be spending our 34th wedding anniversary sheltering in place during a pandemic? We dressed up, drank champagne, danced, and talked about happiness. In a non-pandemic year (remember those?), I often skip New Year’s Eve. By the time I’ve partied my way through Halloween, Thanksgiving, Winter Solstice, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and our wedding anniversary (December 27th, 34 years ago), I’m usually longing for a night in with my feet up. But not this year. I am staying vigilant until the very last second of 2020. If this year has some sneaky surprise horror ending planned, at least it won’t catch me unawares. And even if 2020 meekly lies down in its coffin, I want to bear witness as the universe drives a stake through its heart and slams the lid on it forever. Then I intend to dance on its grave singing “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead.” Satisfying as all that may be, the main purpose of New Year’s Eve is to arrange for better luck in the year ahead. It’s the time to lay down some ground rules and let 2021 know, right from the start, that we expect better treatment than we had from its predecessor. Fortunately, public spirited citizens have spent thousands of years working out ways to make the future rosier — and passed their wisdom on to us. For years I’ve followed three luck-enhancing strategies and am researching others to see if I can up my game.  In Spain and Italy, wearing red undergarments on New Year's Eve is said to bring good luck, especially in your love life. Naturally everybody wants to get in on that! When Rich and I moved to Spain, we soon learned that absolutely everyone wears their lucky bragas rojas (red undergarments) on New Year’s Eve. In the excitement of last year’s celebrations I forgot to put mine on and have worried ever since that 2020 was entirely my fault. If so, sorry about that, folks! I’ve certainly learned my lesson. I’m hoping you, my readers, will help balance the cosmic scales by donning your own bragas rojas on December 31st. Don’t worry, you’re not expected to reveal the jolly undies to anybody. Unless you happen to live in the tiny town of La Font de la Figuera near Valencia, where it’s customary to strip down to your scarlets and run through streets lined with cheering neighbors. I was considering introducing this custom here in San Anselmo, California, but Rich — who is usually game for any lark — pointed out that spending New Year’s Eve in jail for indecent exposure would hardly start the year off on the right foot.  Kids, don't try this unless you happen to live in La Font de la Figuera, Spain. Another Spanish custom I love is las doce uvas de la buena suerte, the twelve grapes of good luck. As the clock strikes midnight, you pop a grape into your mouth at each chime of the clock. Insider tip: grapes are remarkably hard to swallow that fast, so peel them, buy very small ones, or get the canned variety soaked in juice. And whatever you do, swallow all twelve. “I was in England one year,” a Spanish friend told me. “And dropped one of the grapes in a public square. It rolled away and I raced after it, grabbed it, and ate it, to the horror of my friends. But hey, who cares about hygiene when your luck is at stake?” I was aghast when I first heard this story, but after 2020, I see her point.  The store-bought grapes are a lot easier to swallow in time with the clock chiming midnight. Washing them down with champagne helps, too. As soon as I finish my grapes, I’ll be tossing a bucket of water out the front door. This satisfying custom, which originated in Mexico, Cuba, or Puerto Rico (depending on whose account you believe), evicts any negative energy that might be lingering about the house. Ideally you carry the bucket from room to room to collect all the bad juju, then you pitch the water out a window or the front door. For extra good luck avoid dumping it on any passing pets or pedestrians.  New Year's in Montevideo, Uruguay. Photo by El Mundo Lately I’ve been on the lookout for other good-luck rituals. But like running down San Anselmo Avenue in my underwear, few seem really practical. For instance, there’s “first footer,” popular in Great Britain and elsewhere, which claims it’s auspicious to have a dark-haired male as your first visitor in the new year. Now that I’m sheltering in place, who am I going to get — the UPS guy? The Danes banish evil spirits by smashing old plates against the front doors of friends and relatives; the bigger your pile of crockery shards, the more fortune will smile on you. But somehow I don’t feel my neighbors would take this in the warm-hearted, fun-loving spirit intended. Nor would they (or the hyper-vigilant fire department two blocks away) appreciate me torching effigies of my enemies in the back yard, as is common in Ecuador and Panama. A friend of mine came up with a good alternative: he bought a piñata of a politician who will soon be leaving office, cut off its head, beat it with a stick, and drove his car over it. Twice. Will that bring him luck? Who knows? But he said it felt terrific at the time. Every country and culture has its own traditions, and while we can scoff at them as superstition and tomfoolery, I believe it’s fun (and wise) to do our bit to entice Lady Luck back into our lives. We’ve certainly missed her this past year. What will 2021 look like? Speculation ranges from more of the same (which will certainly be true for a while) or a return to life as we once knew it (a lovely fantasy). The truth is, the world has changed too much to bounce back to the old normal, and so have we. And that’s not all bad; some parts of 2020 are worth carrying forward. (Yes, they are!) For instance, many of us have found inner strength, resilience, and creativity we never knew we had. Just look at all the people who have learned how to bake sourdough bread (yes, I’m thinking of you, Phil), play the ukulele (I know at least three), or master the intricacies of Zoom (too many of you to count). Rich is taking an online course called The Science of Happiness offered by the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley; it’s free if you don’t want a diploma. You’ll be hearing a lot more about it when he finishes the course, but asked what he’s learned so far he said, “Happiness isn’t about you; it’s much larger than that. It’s about social connections, kindness, and community. You can’t pursue happiness, but when you pursue opportunities to serve others, happiness is often a by-product.” As one recent study discovered, “Helping others can help you feel better during the pandemic.” This video gives an idea what the happiness course is about. Even if we pull out all the stops with grapes, buckets of water, and red undies, the year ahead is filled with uncertainties. Have we learned the survival lessons that will enable us to make good decisions (and good sourdough) next year? Can the vaccines vanquish this nasty virus? Will the happiness course make Rich happier? I can’t answer those questions, but I can tell you one thing for sure. It is going to feel wonderful to say, “Adios 2020!”  This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week. YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY  On a recent White Christmas-themed date night, Rich and I added snowflakes to the windows, drank eggnog, and constructed tin foil hats for an upcoming Festivus Zoom gathering. Yes, even in 2020 we're still party animals. When Ernest Hemmingway was writing A Farewell to Arms, he asked F. Scott Fitzgerald to critique the manuscript. Fitzgerald’s thoughtful, nuanced analysis ran for ten pages and suggested changing the ending. Hemingway’s reply? A succinct, “Kiss my ass.” This story appeared in my horoscope this week, followed by, “I suggest a different approach for you, Libra. In my view, now is a good time to solicit feedback and mirroring from trusted allies. What do they think about the current state of your life and work?” So now’s your chance, trusted allies. If there’s anything you’d like me to write more about in this blog (comfort food recipes, pandemic survival tips, Rich wielding power tools and duct tape) or discuss less (see previous list), please let me know in the comments section below. Unlike Hemingway, I actually like suggestions. Sometimes I even follow them.  Hemingway loved cats for their "absolute emotional honesty" and always shared with his felines the sugar mouse from his Christmas stocking. Apparently this one liked wine with her mouse. OK, now that I’ve dealt with my astrological karma, let me ask you another question: Have you seen the headlines announcing that due to Covid-19 “Christmas is Cancelled”? The fringe media even calls Dr. Fauci “the Grinch Who Stole Christmas.” To these scurrilous statements I say, “Poppycock, hogwash, and codswallop!” The fact is, nobody can steal or cancel a holiday. Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, pagan Yule, Hogmanay, and every other red-letter day on the calendar will roll around precisely on schedule, just as surely as the shortest day of the year will show up on December 21st, no matter what. The only thing changing is how we celebrate our holidays. But then, doesn’t it always? In prehistoric times, the shortest, darkest, coldest days of the year found our ancestors huddling together around a flame to keep alive the hope of surviving to see another spring. By Roman times, they’d figured out that when the night was dark and full of terrors, alcohol helped, and lo! the drunken revels known as Bacchanalia were born. “Morality and restraint were politely shown the back door, schools were closed, no criminals were punished,” reports the Independent. “Slaves were allowed to swap places with their masters, and one was elected king for the duration of the festival. The wealthy distributed gifts to the poor.” If you’ve ever attended an office holiday party, you can probably relate to the vibe.  Nobody parties like the ancient Romans. In the old Norse tradition, a massive Yule log was dragged into the fireplace, often with one end sticking out into the room; as it burned, you kept shoving it further in. You had to light it using a scrap of last year's log, and if it didn't catch on the first try or went out during the next twelve days, bad luck was sure to follow. Anyone whose fire-lit shadow appeared to be headless knew they had a date with the grim reaper. Many restless ghosts roamed the earth during the longest nights of the year, giving rise to Dickens’ famous story, A Christmas Carol, and the legend of Santa Claus. The fat man in the red suit was originally Saint Nicholas, who wanted to help three impoverished girls at risk of being forced into prostitution. He dropped three gold coins down the chimney, where they landed in the girls’ stockings drying on the hearth.  St. Nicholas was a 4th century bishop of the Eastern Orthodox Church and a man of color; his sidekick was an African Muslim. By the 1870s he was depicted as a white guy, and American cartoonist Thomas Nast gave him the red suit (long before he became a mascot for the Coca-Cola company in the 1920s). Photo: The Temple Gallery My point is: the holidays we celebrate, and the shape those celebrations take, are constantly evolving. If you have any doubt about that, just look at the carols we're singing this year. Some of the language and images in that song hark back more to the Bacchanalian revels than to the sanitized version of the holidays familiar to us from Hallmark cards and Hollywood movies. And that’s appropriate; we live in edgier times. But one thing hasn’t changed: the need to reach out to family and friends, sharing comfort and joy, if only through the magic of Zoom. Rich and I spend a lot of time Zooming these days. Last night we gathered online with Rich’s old Navy buddies to celebrate Festivus. I always thought this holiday was invented by the staff of Seinfeld, but I’ve now learned it was Readers Digest editor Daniel O’Keefe who dreamed it up in 1966 to commemorate his first date with his wife. Thirty years later his son, a writer on Sinefeld, gave the world “Festivus for the rest of us.” In addition to the traditional aluminum pole, feats of strength, and airing of grievances, our celebration included donning festive hats. My Festivus grievances were ready, too. A few days ago, we Zoomed with American friends in New Zealand, who told us how the Kiwis approached the pandemic. Within a month of the first reported Covid case in the country, all borders, ports, and airports were closed, and by March 25 there was a strict nationwide lockdown. Cases dwindled, restrictions were eased, and by June 8 life returned to normal except for border controls. That’s right, the pandemic has been over for six months in New Zealand. “We live normally,” our pals explained. “And except for the tourist sector, the economy has completely rebounded.” In that nation of 4,822,233 people, there have been 2096 cases of Covid and 25 deaths. At first I was in awe, and then the outrage hit me. Stopping Covid in its tracks was no pipe dream; New Zealand accomplished it six months ago. Here in America, we had the same scientific data, and far greater resources at our disposal; what we lacked was the political will. By May 27 we’d lost 100,000 people to the virus; just this Monday the death toll passed 300,000, and still there’s no coherent national plan. We’ve suffered 200,000 needless, preventable coronavirus deaths, and another American dies of the virus every 36 seconds, when we could — should! — all be living in a post-pandemic society with a healthy economy.  Remember when we could do this? If we were New Zealanders, we'd have spent the last six months living a normal, Covid-free life. Photo by New Zealand Trails. “You might want to tone down your grievance a bit during the Festivus Zoom call,” Rich warned me, after I’d ranted on about this for days. “Don’t want to frighten the horses.” He was right. I put on my tin foil Santa hat, took a few deep breaths, and counted my blessings. Like the debt of gratitude we owe past generations. Our primitive ancestors taught us to keep the flame of hope burning through the longest nights. The Romans showed us how to raise a glass instead of cursing the darkness. And Santa may have stopped dropping gold coins in our stockings, but he does stuff them with chocolate, which helps enormously. One of my favorite blessings? The community of my readers. You guys make me laugh, cry, think, and find strength to go on. Your thoughtful comments help me shape the direction of this blog (so send feedback below). You’ll no doubt be too busy with Bacchanalian revels to do much reading, so I won't be posting next week. Rich joins me in wishing you all a splendiferous [insert name of holiday here] as we stagger to the end (yay!) of 2020 (whew!).  OK, this may be taking PPE a bit too far. Photo by Getty Images ENJOY THE HOLIDAYS, MY FRIENDS! STAY SAFE, BE MERRY, AND HOPE 2021 IS A BETTER YEAR (ADMITTEDLY, A LOW BAR). This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week.  Navigating the holidays requires every bit of wit, grit, and gumption we've got. Take shopping, for instance. Fun at first, it quickly degenerates into a morass of doubts: “Is this enough? Too much? Did I give this to them last year? Did they give one just like it to me?” When David Niven was an impoverished young actor, he and his roommate, Errol Flynn, solved the affordability problem by re-gifting things that arrived for them. Until one unfortunate day Niven sent off a lovely leather wallet to the very person who’d sent it to him; he might have tried to pass it off as coincidence except the guy had had Niven’s initials embossed on it. Oops! On another occasion, Niven bought a gorgeous set of handkerchiefs for a young lady he was romancing, and she gave him a car. You just can’t win at the gift game. Juggling family obligations can be equally exasperating. In the old, pre-pandemic days there were endless negotiations divvying up precious celebration time. Goofy relatives became houseguests, driving everybody crazy, as in the movie Christmas Vacation. After Aunt Bethany absent-mindedly gift-wraps her cat, and the jello mold, a harassed Ellen exclaims to her daughter, “I don't know what say, but it’s Christmas and we’re all in misery.”  "Mom, this box is meowing," says Rusty in the film Christmas Vacation. “That’s the thing about unhappiness. All it takes is for something worse to come along and you realize it was actually happiness after all.” — Queen Elizabeth, The Crown Big, boisterous family holidays are the best and the worst of times. Right now it's easy to view them through the rosy lens of nostalgia, but let's not forget the stiletto-sharp jabs only blood kin can deliver. The Crown is full of cringe-worthy family moments, such as Prince Andrew venting annoyance with his mother for “thoughtlessly” taking up media attention opposing apartheid when the headlines should be full of his wedding to Sarah Ferguson. To which Charles replies, “You can hardly blame the newspapers for wanting to write about something other than the wedding of a fringe member of the family who will never be king.” Ouch! “Happiness,” said comedian George Burns, “is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.” The enforced separation of the pandemic has changed many relationships, including mine with my brother Mike. We were close as kids, but as adults leading busy lives on separate continents, we connected cordially but very sporadically. As luck would have it, Mike and his wife Deb moved to Spain in February, just weeks before lockdown. Ever since then the four of us have Zoomed multiple times a week sharing news, survival tips, and Netflix recommendations. Mike and I are closer now than we’ve been since our school days, and I count that among the great blessings of 2020.  Mike and I were born just 17 months apart, the frontrunners in what would become a pack of six kids. “The strongest person is the person who isn’t scared to be alone.” – Alice Harmon, The Queen’s Gambit “You know you’ve really learned to live with yourself,” I once heard, “if you can drive around the block without turning the radio on.” The pandemic has taught us all how to live with less human contact and often less noise and busyness in our lives. And there’s something to be said for that. Yes, of course, I miss hugs, kissing everybody on both cheeks, and long, crowded dinner parties chatting about nothing and everything. But these unprecedented periods of retreat from the world offer us a rare opportunity to slow down. “Our life is frittered away by detail … simplify, simplify.” I remember reading Thoreau's words while racing around building my career and thinking, “Yeah, that’s easy to say when you live in the woods by a pond. But I inhabit the real world with real deadlines.” Sheltering in place may enable us to take a step back, consider our priorities, and find ways to hit the reset button on our destiny.  George Bailey shopping for luggage he'll never get to use in It's a Wonderful Life. George Bailey: “You know what the three most exciting sounds in the world are?” Uncle Billy: “Uh huh. Breakfast is served; lunch is served; dinner...” George Bailey: “No no no no. Anchor chains, plane motors, and train whistles.” — It’s a Wonderful Life Throughout It's a Wonderful Life, George Bailey's only dream is to go abroad and have adventures, but events conspire to keep him at home. Much as we are now. I get wistful emails every week from readers mourning the fact our wings have been clipped by the pandemic. There is no telling when — or even (OK, I’ll say it) if — we will ever again have such freedom to roam the world. The vaccines offer hope, but with Pfizer once again revising its production estimates downwards, the timeline keeps getting longer and fuzzier. Officials talk of distribution in December, but just yesterday I asked a Walgreens pharmacist when she expected to be giving Covid inoculations, and she said, “Summer.” My hopes of being near the front of the line due to my age are wobbling, thanks to articles such as this morning’s “’There absolutely will be a black market’: How the rich and privileged can skip the line for Covid 19 vaccines.” It seems some people with power and influence plan to pressure concierge physicians to provide false documentation of pre-existing conditions, hire lobbyists to get their demographic declared “essential” — yes, financial industry, I’m talking about you — or buy black market meds. As one radio commentator put it, “How long will it be before low-income essential workers sell their ID badges for $2500?” If we can’t rely on the government to provide protection, where can we turn?  When times get weird, tin foil hats are a must, according to the movie Signs. “So the aliens can't read our minds.” — Morgan, Signs You've already laid in ample supplies of hand sanitizer and masks, but how are you fixed for tin foil hats? Since first appearing in a 1927 sci-fi story, aluminum foil headgear has been embraced by conspiracy theorists as a barrier against electromagnetic pulses, alien telepathy, and government mind control, to name but a few. Surely deflecting Covid-19 can’t be far behind. When Rich and I put up our tree this week, I was trying to think of a topper appropriate for this bizarre year, and suddenly it came to me.  A year like no other demands a very special tree topper. This is ours. Do I think a tin foil hat will protect the tree, or us, from anything whatsoever? No, of course not. But it makes me chuckle every time I walk by it. And that counts for a lot, especially these days. So if you find yourself in need of a psycho-spiritual pick-me-up, grab some aluminum foil and get to work. It’s easy, it’s fun, and it offers a pretty reliable cure for the pandemic holiday blues. What are you doing to keep your spirits bright? Let me know in the comments below. YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get.
Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week.  Our Thanksgiving guest list was a little different this year. “Who is that glamorous couple?” I asked Bill the Printer one long ago snowy day in Ohio. He'd just run off a stack of holiday cards featuring a gorgeously lit photo of a handsome couple in evening dress. “Are they actors? Millionaire philanthropists?” Bill laughed. “That’s what they want you to think. They’re Joan and Darren Silverman, just ordinary folks. But every year they dress up, produce a flashy holiday card, and send it out to celebrities, hoping for a card in return. And since celebrities can’t always remember who they’ve met during the year, sometimes it works. By now they’re on quite a few high-end mailing lists.” He named some TV personalities, minor film stars, and rising politicos. “Ingenious,” I said. Then inspiration struck. “I know, I’ll do the same thing to them!” Bill thought this was hilarious and — small towns being relaxed about such things — had no qualms about providing me with their address. I was in his shop picking up my own cards, and I went right home and wrote one to them. “Joan and Darren, you’re the best! Continued success in the year ahead.” It was in the mail by nightfall. Bill phoned a few days later. “They’re completely flummoxed,” he said. “They told me they can’t figure out who you guys are!”  "You think the holidays are stressful for YOU? I've got 1,763 fleas to send cards to!" We exchanged holiday cards with the Silvermans for years, and every time theirs arrived, Rich and I roared with laughter and considered it a highlight of the season. A timely reminder that the holidays aren’t about being perfect or feeling sentimental or finding the meaning of life. They’re about staggering to the end of the year as best we can, arriving disheveled and exhausted, with just enough creative energy left to think up a few last bits of fun to round out the season. Take our Thanksgiving feast, for instance. This being 2020, we knew it would be madness to gather with friends or relatives, so I suggested to Rich that we populate our table with various non-human members of the household: Two life-sized skeletons from Mexico, one of which I’d given to Rich during our courtship, the other I’d presented to him as a wedding gift. A Mayan head wearing a Thai headdress and 3-D sunglasses. A Buddhist monk. And Lucille, who once modeled fashion accessories in a shop and now serves as Rich’s hat rack. “This isn’t creepy, right?” I asked Rich. “It’s just for company, like Tom Hanks and his friend Wilson the Volleyball in Castaway.” “Are you kidding? It’s Thanksgiving with the Addams family.”  I sent a photo of our Thanksgiving table companions to European friends in Seville, with the subject line “This isn’t too weird, is it?” They promptly wrote back saying the very fact we could even ask that question was deeply worrying. “This is how we imagine your feast,” they added, sending us a link to the classic comedy skit of the butler who drinks all the wine poured out for absent friends. We may not have a butler, but we did our best to create a vivid atmosphere. Particularly sharp-eyed readers may have noticed in the photo at the start of this post that we used the gratitude quilt as our tablecloth. The quilt project has exceeded my wildest expectations. Many thanks to all the readers, friends, and relatives who told me what they’re grateful for this year. Your comments were wonderful: funny, profound, quirky, and so very, very you. I had to condense the wording considerably, to make the lettering legible while writing with a fat, felt-tipped marker on the rough quilted surface, but I did my best to capture the spirit of every remark.  The quilt is now permanently enshrined as our holiday tablecloth, for as long as it lasts. We have agreed wine stains and grease spots will only add to its character. I still have some comments to add, but there's plenty of room for more, so if you haven’t contributed yet, please use the comments section below to let me know what you’re thankful for this year. Even 2020 had its bright spots. (Yes, it did!)  What am I thankful for? The Covid-19 vaccine. With our national numbers climbing to dizzying heights — 13.8 million cases and 271,000 deaths at last count — recent announcements that scientists have come up with effective immunizations sparked widespread rejoicing. But the fizzy mood of unity falls flat the moment talk turns to the distribution plan. Because there is no plan. There won’t be nearly enough to go around, at least at first. Pfizer and Moderna combined are expected to produce and distribute enough vaccines for 45 million people by the end of January, leaving 283 million Americans still unprotected. The current administration has refused to take on the task of organizing the distribution, leaving it up to the governor of each state to decide who gets first dibs on the two-part vaccine. Everyone agrees healthcare workers are the top priority, but donnybrooks of Biblical proportions have erupted over who comes next in each state. Non-medical essential workers, older adults, obese adults with compromised immune systems, meat packers, ski instructors living in shared housing … the lists go on and on.  I love this card, a cautionary tale about the results of greed overcoming common sense. Rich remains optimistic about our chances. “Luckily, we’re living in Marin County, the epicenter of the anti-vaccination movement. That means a lot less demand from our neighbors. We’re older adults, so after healthcare workers, we’re practically at the head of the line.” The powers that be continue to duke it out, and I suspect not much will happen until the new administration takes over on January 20. Whatever the timeline, I’m holding on to the idea that the vaccine might be coming my way by the spring, paving the way for our return to Seville. Spain’s numbers are falling now, another hopeful sign, although more spikes are likely everywhere due to super-spreader family togetherness this month. In the meantime, I’m sending messages of holiday cheer to my amigos around the world. The few I have street addresses for will be getting real, paper holiday cards, something I haven’t sent out since I moved to Seville. Sadly, I can no longer find the address I once had for the Silvermans. Which by the way, is not their real name; I didn’t want to reveal their identity and risk spoiling their game, should they still be at it. And I hope they are. In fact, I imagine them sitting by a fireplace writing out their bogus cards again this year, trying for Tom Hanks, Betty White, and Dr. Fauci. I picture one turning to the other and remarking, “Remember those total strangers who used to send us holiday cards? The McCanns? Boy, those guys were really weird.” I like to think in our own small way we helped make their holidays truly special.  Not weird, right? Our old wooden table, which normally winters indoors, is staying out on the back deck this year, and I wanted her attired in protective yet festive gear. YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, however weird things get.
Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week.  Wind-up toy races are always popular in our house. The fact these chicks tend to go in circles and fall over just adds to the excitement. Many of my Spanish friends are firmly convinced of two things: 1) Thanksgiving is the most significant holiday in the US calendar, and 2) all American women spend their leisure hours sewing quilts. In vain have I protested that I’ve never quilted in my life. Equally impossible is convincing them that the prevalence of Thanksgiving scenes in movies is not due to the occasion's supreme importance but because it’s the one holiday we all celebrate in roughly the same way. On the fourth Thursday in November, millions of us set aside religious, ethnic, even political differences to fulfill the time-honored tradition of bringing out the best in family disfunction since 1621. Will it will really feel like Thanksgiving without the chaos of a large, multi-generational donnybrook? Might the day fall flat without arguments over seating arrangements, whether marshmallows truly belong on sweet potatoes, and why your temperamental uncle stormed out shouting “You cut the turkey without me? You might as well have stabbed me in the heart,” as in the iconic scene from the movie Avalon?  Luckily, a socially distanced Thanksgiving means millions of us will be spared seating chart nightmares this year.  Apple cider mimosas. Photo by DIY.Candy Naturally, those of us who are sensibly avoiding super-spreader holiday feasts are feeling a little adrift right now. I’m deeply saddened that Rich and I aren’t in Seville to hold our traditional Thanksgiving potluck followed by an afternoon of old-fashioned parlor games. Clearly I’ve got to find fresh ways to make the day special for the two of us, perhaps even create a few new traditions. Here’s are my best ideas so far. Sip apple cider mimosas. I found this simple recipe online and believe it’s just what I need to start the day off right. You rim the glass with a 50-50 mix of brown sugar and cinnamon (moisten the rim first to make it stick), pour in equal amounts of cider and champagne, and sip away. If you’re not sure this is for you, try it out well in advance (today, if possible) and repeat as often as necessary to make a fully informed decision. Avoid supermarkets; do last-minute shopping online. The CDC recommends staying out of crowded grocery stores in the run-up to turkey day, and that sounds like good wisdom to me. So I’m stocking up on Thanksgiving provisions this week, then filling in any last minute gaps with an online order from a nearby market with reliable delivery service. Ask people what they're thankful for. In the early years of our Thanksgiving feasts in Seville, people were bashful about standing up and toasting things for which they were grateful. Now our guests, including small kids, tell me they start thinking about their toasts days, even weeks in advance. So let me ask you: If you had to stand up right now and name something you’re thankful for, what would it be? Even 2020 had some good moments (yes it did!). My list includes a friend getting off the ventilator, the election signaling change, and (we hope) viable vaccines at last. I’m spending a lot of time on Zoom, often with those who are usually at my Thanksgiving feast, and I’ll be asking everyone to tell me what they are grateful for these days.  What are you thankful for? Let me know and I'll add it to my Thanksgiving tablecloth. Write those thankful thoughts on a tablecloth. I loved this idea when I ran across it online yesterday, and I immediately suggested to Rich that we try it this year. “We can write down what people tell us they’re grateful for,” I said. "The article suggests buying a canvas drop cloth.” But Rich was sure we had something in the attic that would serve, and after a brief rummage around, he emerged with an ancient quilt the movers had used to pad our furniture on the truck back in 2007. The quilt is cheap, battered, threadbare, and sporting unidentifiable stains and patches of masking tape. “Perfect for 2020,” I said. Play games online. My family (and I say this lovingly) is obsessed with games of wit and chance. So I’ve been checking out versions of charades and Pictionary that use an online word generator to get the Zoom party going. Testing knowledge is another family sport; we’ve been known to idle away hours on the beach with stacks of cards from Trivial Pursuit. There are countless online options for group and solo fun such as Thanksgiving Trivia and virtual pub quizzes on topics such as Game of Thrones and Bond movies. I’m about the least musical person on the planet, but as a film buff, I was mesmerized by the multiple-choice Movie Music Quiz, and by this video, which gives you ten seconds to name that tune. Hold a scavenger hunt IRL (in real life) with housemates. When I was a kid my mother loved to send us off on scavenger hunts; she’d give us a list of objects to find and we’d be out of her hair for hours. With just two of us playing this Thanksgiving, I thought Rich and I could each come up with three items for the list, so we’d each be seeking a total of six things. These could be simple (something you eat spaghetti with) to profound (an object that represents a mystery in your life) to esoteric (yesterday, today, tomorrow). This isn’t a competition, it’s an opportunity to use ordinary objects to spark meaningful conversation. Possibly over another round of apple cider mimosas. Shop for holiday cards. In the late afternoon, between turkey, games, and Zoom calls, I expect I’ll have a little downtime, which I can use to prep for the next round of celebrations. Living overseas for so long, I’ve fallen into the convenient habit of sending out digital holiday greetings. But this year, when so much of our lives are spent staring at screens, I feel the need to reach out in a more tangible way. So I’m sending out old-fashioned greeting cards — yes, paper, ink, stamps, the whole nine yards — with wording that properly reflects the spirit of 2020. As you gear up for Thanksgiving, even if that’s just buying a frozen turkey pot pie and picking out a movie, I hope you’ll pause for a moment and look back over 2020. No, wait, don’t relive the whole ghastly year (shudder!), just see if you can find a few highlights that spark gratitude. And then tell me about them in the comments below, so I can add them to my Thanksgiving quilt. “My Thanksgiving quilt.” Yikes! Typing those words, I realize that maybe my Spanish friends weren’t so far off the mark after all. Thanksgiving is, if not the biggest, perhaps the best of our holidays, the one that’s abundant without being as overwhelming as the high-octane December merrymaking. And now I’ve managed to add a quilt into the mix. I don’t think this battered old furniture pad is precisely what my amigos had in mind, but now it strikes me as a fitting symbol of America’s imperfect, makeshift, ever-evolving holiday. And a good reminder that at this turning point of the year, it’s time to leave the past behind, live as fully as possible (yes, even in our present tattered state), and embrace the future with a lighter, warmer heart. So what are you thankful for right now? What Thanksgiving traditions are you fulfilling this year? Please let me know in the comments section below. PS: Don't look for a post next week; I'm taking time off to enjoy the holiday. I'll be back with a new article in December. YOU MIGHT ALSO ENJOY This post is part of my ongoing series of articles on surviving the pandemic while holding on to some shreds of our sanity and sense of humor, and remembering to enjoy life's small comforts. Sign up HERE to get free stories in your inbox each week. |
 Karen McCann
Welcome!
I'm an American travel writer based in Spain and currently living in California. As we journey through the pandemic together, my blog provides a regular supply of survival tips, comfort food recipes, and the wry humor we all need to lighten our hearts on dark days. I think of my blog as an ongoing conversation, so please join in and leave comments at the end of my posts. Sign up below to get updates when I publish anything new. 
BLOG ARCHIVES
April 2021
CATEGORIES
All
|
