“Coping with the Corona Virus”
© Eddie Rhoades
BittersweetGardens.Com
How am I coping with the coronavirus? I’m glad you asked. I feel like the wife and I are doing better than most. One problem is I have too much time to think. I will soon to be 80 years old. I have missed out on so many opportunities in my life because I am such a procrastinator. I have been losing a lot of things. First I lost a digging tool out in the garden, then I lost a book, next I lost a watch then my car keys. So, I made a list of all these things I had lost and then …
I lost the list.
A lot of freedoms have been taken away I can’t just go over to a friend’s house and visit for hours. I miss that a lot. I have occasional bouts of depression, then I see all these young people with tattoos, so I went out and got myself one. It’s on the underside of my right forearm. It’s the suicide hot line number.
There is an old movie titled Cold Turkey starring Dick Van Dyke, and his wife is played by Mary Tyler Moore. Both decided to quit smoking. Next thing you know, the whole town decides to quit. Whenever things get tense, Dick and Mary join hands and head upstairs to the bedroom. My wife and I decided to try something along that line to deal with the Corona virus. That’s when I decided to quit taking Viagra, because all it did was make me taller.
Truthfully, one of the things that helped me through the pandemic was visiting my daughter and the grandkids. After that, my garden was my salvation. I ordered scions of special cultivars and waited for the first warm days of spring to start grafting. At Green Meadows Community Garden, I have been named Curator of their orchard. This orchard will be another feather in the cap of Cobb Master Gardeners and Cobb County itself. This is also the location of Jim Bearden’s Bluebird Trail. At this time, we are growing pomegranate, Asian persimmon and seedless American persimmon, Asian and European pears, Pawpaw, medlar, apples, figs, mulberries, plums, cold-hardy citrus, thornless blackberries, pineapple guava, che and jujube. All of these you can grow in your own home garden.
I mentioned having too much time on my hands to think about anything and everything. I think it is amazing how many adults cannot spell. The Internet exposes these people. I think about this planet Earth that we all live on. How many billions of people do we really need? We use the ocean as a giant commode. We clear the forests so we can build more houses, raise more cattle and grow more crops. We are rapidly driving more and more animals into extinction. We treat the symptoms but not the problem, and the problem is overpopulation. This pandemic and isolation has me considering my lot in life. This causes me to be depressed. But if I count my blessings, I begin to see how good I really have it. I have a nice house that is paid for and my vehicle is paid for. Not only that, but I recently won the Alabama Million Dollar lottery.
Their lottery is different from all the others. I get a dollar a year for the next million years.
My garden has been my salvation. As far as coping with the isolation of this virus, I have taken both my shots and I wear my mask almost all the time. That mask helps a lot with dust and pollen.
As you can see by the attached picture of me, I am doing fine. I am thrilled we are starting to meet in person. Please wear your name tags at our club meetings.
“Is There Anybody Out There?” – From Eddie’s original album, Universal Love
BittersweetGardens.com 