Greetings all.

It’s been a while since I actually composed a blog post that wasn’t technically oriented (I believe the last such one was about going to see Jeff Lorber in concert, last October or so). That said, I mentioned in a recent Twitter post, that with the ubiquity of “instant” social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram, blogging can (for non-professional bloggers like myself) can easily fall by the wayside. The other have of that tweet mentioned that I started blogging in 2007, and I miss the aspect of self-publishing from “my own garden”.

Well, we are all currently dealing with the global pandemic known as COVIC-19. Some like to refer to this as the “new normal”, a colloquial term, which is all well and fine. There are some things that from the “old normal” that are not present and I don’t mind making sacrifices for at this point, the thing that’s most bothersome today essential fall into two buckets for me. The first is the overall inconvenience of things. I don’t have a great deal of heartburn dealing with them but, nonetheless, they are here for the immediate future.

The second thing is more annoying and aggravating by far – that is having to deal with those who refuse to make, what I tend to think are, simple sacrifices like maintaining physical distancing and not following the CDC guidelines for wearing a mask while in contact with others. What that simply tells me is that you have no regards for your own life, in the midst of ALLLLL that is continually being reported about rising case numbers and deaths, which means you have no regards for my life. I’m going to leave my opinion regarding that in the last sentence before this.

I got out in the gorgeous weather today and was driven around town by my son, who is trying to get the requisite number of hours in to get his driver license. Considering the pandemic, I’m not sure that will happen anytime soon, but nevertheless, the hours have to be logged. We’re approaching summer and I’m glad, but it will obviously be a summer like none I’ve ever experienced. One thing I’ll say, this current situation has seemingly added extra time in my life for different things. One of them has been, what I like to call “introspection under quarantine”. I’ve seen a number of social media posts basically saying that when the pandemic passes, we don’t need to “go back to normal, because normal wasn’t working”. While it’s clear that when it’s said “back to normal”, that means the non-pandemic life. I get that, however there is, to me, a lot to consider in the message of such social media posts. I’m striving for a non-pandemic lifestyle, through the introspection I have been doing, that will exceed the pre-pandemic. Did a pandemic have to come along to drive me to that decision? No, however here we are. In the end it should always be about pressing forward and for the better, no matter what challenges arise. Easier said than done? Surely, but it’s “by all means, necessary”.

Hope you and yours are well.

Best,

Fresh.