I am so sorry for your loss and that you weren't able to visit and reminisce with him again.
" in these covidian times, whose long shadow stretches into our futures,". What rankles for me is when I hear every few days, "Covid is over." It's another way to shut down conversation. I agree, it will NEVER be over. It is literally, and figuratively for the vaxxed and maybe unvaxxed, in our DNA from here on out. This will be looked upon by survivors in the future as "our" holocaust.
This resonates with me as I experienced an almost identical situation.
My wife owns a florist shop in Sarasota FL. Both she and her shop was never a victim of lockdowns, as because she also sold houseplants, they qualified as an "essential service". Seems like a stretch to me but hey, we were never going to argue that point.
The store remained a refuge of sanity, in a State that didn't lose its mind, while much of the world did. My wife (myself & children were are skeptics) and did not have the jab(s). The store was a mask free business, though ironically all her staff who had jabs and wore masks everywhere else, suspended their fear on a daily basis when they came to work. These employees are also considered friends, but I still found it amazing why they played the good little citizen role 99% of the time but unlike a lot of virtue signalers, were happy to act normal for several hours a day.
Shoppers varied, but most wore masks, though occasionally, one would enter and seeing no one else was wearing them ask if they had to. They were always delighted to remove the pointless rag. There was one standout exception. One day in early 2022, a woman opened the entrance door and peered in.
"Do you mandate mask wearing on your premises?".
"No".
"Well, I won't shop here. How selfish of you not to protect others. I'm never returning".
This initially led to a lot of shocked laughter, but my wife noticed the woman getting into a vehicle with New York plates. This angered her, so she decided to not let this crazy have the last say. She went out to the vehicle and asked the woman to roll her window down. Needless to say, she refused because, hey, you can't be too careful.
"Mam, I see you are from New York. You may have all lost your minds, but here in Florida there hasn't been any mandatory regulations for business owners to require mask wearing. Now, if you are so offended by that, I suggest you fuck right back off to where you came from".
I'd like to add that for my wife to talk to anyone like this, it is unheard of, but I sure was proud that day.
I live in the Northeastern US, therefore the attitude of the shopper from New York didn't surprise me. However, it brought back unpleasant memories because her behaviour was similar to what I often encountered. People had acquired authoritarian proclivities through a type of osmosis resulting from their obsequious deference to the powers that be. Suddenly, they felt ultra-powerful and had no qualms about showing off their ridiculous but dangerous attitude.
Two examples:
During the lockdown, someone I know wanted to call the police because neighbouring children were outdoors playing on their lawn. What kept her from calling the police was fear they would infect her with covid when they arrived to get her report.
A friend yelled at the driver of the ice cream truck which summer after summer visited our neighbourhood to sell ice cream bars. She thought it was dangerous for this vendor to interact with customers even if they were more than willing to buy his products. What can be more natural than being outdoors and wanting ice cream during a hot summer's day?
This dystopian behaviour that takes on the guise of normalcy is the true infectious agent.
What a wonderful story! Kudos to you and your family and your wife especially for her strong stance -- you are inspiring. And thank you for sharing this!
Perhaps you were already aware, but if not, can you help?
In aproximately March 2020 I found a NZ government meta analysis of all the studies done on masks. The conclusion was that they were worse than pointless. That the only benefit being it created an illusion that people were doing something that helped. When in reality, they created more problems because of a false sense of security and that they would not be used properly & people touching them then say produce in supermarkets would then be contaminating.
I shared this for a month of so in the hope it would help people realize they were being lied to. One day the link was met with "This information is no longer available" or words to that effect.
I'd love to get a copy but I suspect it would take a freedom of information request now and being based in Florida, I doubt they'd accept it.
Is this of interest for you to pursue? If so, I can probably track down the link it related to and provide for you.
I believe this was the one. I just tried and receive the message:
"Sorry. You don't have permission to access this page on our server."
Please let me know if you can or are able to get a copy. Given the insane reaction Ahearn led in NZ, it only makes sense they'd want to bury this as it contradicts what she did.
Thank you for sharing this. Like everything to do with our mind/brain/psyche
I find it fascinating. There is one thing (the way I see it) that has to do with
let's say, scientific knowledge and then there is the whole spectrum one experiences on an personal, individual level that really intrigues and fascinates me. In my case there are many dreams I have to "deal with" including ones that re-apear, long forgotten after many years. As for remembering, out of the blue something suddenly "pops out" after forty or so years, just like that, with nothing that could have prompted it. Like, oh yeah, sure, I remember this, but why now? Once it was: "Oh, so that was why I was having those unsettling dreams as a kid (that I still remember).
Thank you very much for this post and I'm very sorry you lost a friend.
Also, now when I hear someone died, my first question is , "Did he take the covid vax?" Not only do I want to know, but if I can plant a few seeds here and there all the better.
Sorry if my method offends, but I'm not your run of the mill well-mannered southern lady. I'm 68, retired, and times-awasting! The world's gone completely nuts! Keep up the great work!
Condolences on the loss of your friend. A truly thoughtful & articulate piece. For me, your reflections on ‘memories’ truly resonated. They concisely consolidated a varied mic of thoughts/experiences I’ve had. You’ve encompassed them in a way, that for me provides a better path for acceptance and understanding, then I have yet been able to do on my own.
Thank you so much, I am very happy that my words resonated with you -- it makes this stuff of writing all the more worthwhile. I am appreciative. Hang in there.
I used to have folks who'd play music with me, a few. Now, not a one, although if they passed, I don't know it. For most it was a conscious choice they made to no longer be indoors with me, rather, their wives had made the choice for them...
Sorry about your friend, Dr Garcia. And the whole dream/memory thing is intriguing. I've had dreams that I think I've had multiple times, but I'm not really sure if I have - maybe I just dreamt that I'd already had that dream!
I had a friend who was my best friend all though school and we stayed in contact all our lives, although eventually only at Christmas - she went to Asia and I didn't see her again. But she moved back to the UK when she retired and, although we hadn't got around to meeting up, we ended up in a WhatsApp group with a small number of other old classmates from school. I tried to warn them about the jabs when the boosters were being rolled out (I'd had two myself before finding out what was going on). None of them would listen and my friend's last words to me - because I withdrew from the WhatsApp group in the end - were 'Sorry, Sheila, but I have complete confidence in vaccination'. My reply was that it wasn't a vaccine. She had been a biology teacher, so probably thought of herself as a 'scientist', which I wasn't. She was the fittest, most active person I've ever known, but 6 months later I was at her funeral. It was a bizarre feeling, learning out of the blue that she'd had a catastrophic heart attack - I was both shocked and not shocked at all, because of what I knew.
I am very sorry to hear of your loss in these unbearable circumstances ... I tried voicing my concerns to people -- some listened, many disregarded or cancelled me. It's execrable. Thank you for commenting.
My sincere condolences to you over your loss of a dear friend. As I read this I am filled with anticipatory grief as I expect the grim hand of jab inflicted mortality to reach out and take many away into a too early passing away.
I am then tempted to avoid the pain of yet more loss, by not letting myself bond with people to begin with, by being detatched and 'cool'.
But I am hopelessly human and so will shed many tears.
Another beautifully written piece! Thank you Manny! Sorry to hear of your loss but tis the stuff of our time. When death becomes a regular unquestioned occurrence of the young but also the healthy middle/older person we know we are in for the long haul! A famous Australian politician died suddenly this wk after his morning exercise in Berlin whilst on a business trip. The tributes said nothing of possible cause of death or a mention of autopsy to determine. This is the new kind of reporting around death...if we don’t ask then we won’t know! Things are out of control!
Emanuel, what you have written is in the nature of a long poem, something magnificently expressive and poignant. Farewells are painful things, but you sent off your friend with warmth and courtesy. I am very sorry for the loss you are feeling. Alongside grief there will come memories, lovely memories, more precious now because they will be tinged with this newer shade. There's been an ending but also not an ending because there will exist the reliving of the important moments, the fun moments, and the revelatory moments that will surface for you to remember.
And, Emanuel, thank you for what you have written about memory, that it is an amalgam drawn across the lifespan which within it conceals other memories and leads to new insights. I think yours is a humanistic description befitting the humans that we are, we with our mysterious and active mind. You are offering a defense of memory, the perfect answer to those who attack the power and importance of memory, be it conscious, repressed, suppressed, or recalled. The duality of the mind is its ability to mix science with humanism, a complex mixture that swims in our quadrillion of synapses. How does it all happen?
"I cannot and will not ask the question of the loved ones he left behind, I don’t want to know.
It has all hit home."
I feel your profound sadness Mannie!
Thank you, Bruce
I am so sorry for your loss and that you weren't able to visit and reminisce with him again.
" in these covidian times, whose long shadow stretches into our futures,". What rankles for me is when I hear every few days, "Covid is over." It's another way to shut down conversation. I agree, it will NEVER be over. It is literally, and figuratively for the vaxxed and maybe unvaxxed, in our DNA from here on out. This will be looked upon by survivors in the future as "our" holocaust.
eloquently and aptly put, thank you so much! You are correct about the future's view ....
Very sorry for the loss of your friend. Thank you for sharing this.
Thank you for reading and for your kind comment, it is much appreciated.
Thank you kindly.
This resonates with me as I experienced an almost identical situation.
My wife owns a florist shop in Sarasota FL. Both she and her shop was never a victim of lockdowns, as because she also sold houseplants, they qualified as an "essential service". Seems like a stretch to me but hey, we were never going to argue that point.
The store remained a refuge of sanity, in a State that didn't lose its mind, while much of the world did. My wife (myself & children were are skeptics) and did not have the jab(s). The store was a mask free business, though ironically all her staff who had jabs and wore masks everywhere else, suspended their fear on a daily basis when they came to work. These employees are also considered friends, but I still found it amazing why they played the good little citizen role 99% of the time but unlike a lot of virtue signalers, were happy to act normal for several hours a day.
Shoppers varied, but most wore masks, though occasionally, one would enter and seeing no one else was wearing them ask if they had to. They were always delighted to remove the pointless rag. There was one standout exception. One day in early 2022, a woman opened the entrance door and peered in.
"Do you mandate mask wearing on your premises?".
"No".
"Well, I won't shop here. How selfish of you not to protect others. I'm never returning".
This initially led to a lot of shocked laughter, but my wife noticed the woman getting into a vehicle with New York plates. This angered her, so she decided to not let this crazy have the last say. She went out to the vehicle and asked the woman to roll her window down. Needless to say, she refused because, hey, you can't be too careful.
"Mam, I see you are from New York. You may have all lost your minds, but here in Florida there hasn't been any mandatory regulations for business owners to require mask wearing. Now, if you are so offended by that, I suggest you fuck right back off to where you came from".
I'd like to add that for my wife to talk to anyone like this, it is unheard of, but I sure was proud that day.
Wonderful story!!!
I live in the Northeastern US, therefore the attitude of the shopper from New York didn't surprise me. However, it brought back unpleasant memories because her behaviour was similar to what I often encountered. People had acquired authoritarian proclivities through a type of osmosis resulting from their obsequious deference to the powers that be. Suddenly, they felt ultra-powerful and had no qualms about showing off their ridiculous but dangerous attitude.
Two examples:
During the lockdown, someone I know wanted to call the police because neighbouring children were outdoors playing on their lawn. What kept her from calling the police was fear they would infect her with covid when they arrived to get her report.
A friend yelled at the driver of the ice cream truck which summer after summer visited our neighbourhood to sell ice cream bars. She thought it was dangerous for this vendor to interact with customers even if they were more than willing to buy his products. What can be more natural than being outdoors and wanting ice cream during a hot summer's day?
This dystopian behaviour that takes on the guise of normalcy is the true infectious agent.
Thank you.
I thought people losing their minds at the time was strange, but at least Mass Formation Psychosis explains this.
But why most of these continue to pretend that the lies told and the things done were justified begs belief.
What a wonderful story! Kudos to you and your family and your wife especially for her strong stance -- you are inspiring. And thank you for sharing this!
Perhaps you were already aware, but if not, can you help?
In aproximately March 2020 I found a NZ government meta analysis of all the studies done on masks. The conclusion was that they were worse than pointless. That the only benefit being it created an illusion that people were doing something that helped. When in reality, they created more problems because of a false sense of security and that they would not be used properly & people touching them then say produce in supermarkets would then be contaminating.
I shared this for a month of so in the hope it would help people realize they were being lied to. One day the link was met with "This information is no longer available" or words to that effect.
I'd love to get a copy but I suspect it would take a freedom of information request now and being based in Florida, I doubt they'd accept it.
Is this of interest for you to pursue? If so, I can probably track down the link it related to and provide for you.
I seem to recall this ... yes, please send me the link, I'd appreciate it.
I believe this was the one. I just tried and receive the message:
"Sorry. You don't have permission to access this page on our server."
Please let me know if you can or are able to get a copy. Given the insane reaction Ahearn led in NZ, it only makes sense they'd want to bury this as it contradicts what she did.
https://www.health.govt.nz/system/files/documents/pages/review_of_science_and_policy_around_face_masks_and_covid-19-15may2020.pdf
Thank you for sharing this. Like everything to do with our mind/brain/psyche
I find it fascinating. There is one thing (the way I see it) that has to do with
let's say, scientific knowledge and then there is the whole spectrum one experiences on an personal, individual level that really intrigues and fascinates me. In my case there are many dreams I have to "deal with" including ones that re-apear, long forgotten after many years. As for remembering, out of the blue something suddenly "pops out" after forty or so years, just like that, with nothing that could have prompted it. Like, oh yeah, sure, I remember this, but why now? Once it was: "Oh, so that was why I was having those unsettling dreams as a kid (that I still remember).
Thank you very much for this post and I'm very sorry you lost a friend.
and thank you for your lovely comment, which is much appreciated ... the mind is endlessly fascinating
Also, now when I hear someone died, my first question is , "Did he take the covid vax?" Not only do I want to know, but if I can plant a few seeds here and there all the better.
It's usually my first thought but I have been circumspect about voicing the question .... Keep planting those seeds.
Sorry if my method offends, but I'm not your run of the mill well-mannered southern lady. I'm 68, retired, and times-awasting! The world's gone completely nuts! Keep up the great work!
Condolences on the loss of your friend. A truly thoughtful & articulate piece. For me, your reflections on ‘memories’ truly resonated. They concisely consolidated a varied mic of thoughts/experiences I’ve had. You’ve encompassed them in a way, that for me provides a better path for acceptance and understanding, then I have yet been able to do on my own.
Thank you ! Best wishes from 🇨🇦
Thank you so much, I am very happy that my words resonated with you -- it makes this stuff of writing all the more worthwhile. I am appreciative. Hang in there.
Sorry to hear of your friends passing.
I used to have folks who'd play music with me, a few. Now, not a one, although if they passed, I don't know it. For most it was a conscious choice they made to no longer be indoors with me, rather, their wives had made the choice for them...
I am all alone in the world now.
You are not all alone -- there are those of us who are right with you. Stay strong!
The Unasked is Unknown wherein they've so expertly controlled the crime.
very well put!
Thank you!!! Just had our anniversary this month. Remembering what would have been 18 years!!! I miss him so.😞💔
ah, my condolences .... hang in there!
I am sorry for your loss and for what it entails. I'm so sorry.
Loss of my best friend from the poison foo.
It is hardly bearable .... I'm so sorry to hear this.
Thank
You
It’s been horrible. My heart has been ripped out.
I can only imagine your grief ..... take care of yourself, please, and reach out to others.
Bless you once again for this beautiful article.
Thank you for you very kind words!
Sorry about your friend, Dr Garcia. And the whole dream/memory thing is intriguing. I've had dreams that I think I've had multiple times, but I'm not really sure if I have - maybe I just dreamt that I'd already had that dream!
I had a friend who was my best friend all though school and we stayed in contact all our lives, although eventually only at Christmas - she went to Asia and I didn't see her again. But she moved back to the UK when she retired and, although we hadn't got around to meeting up, we ended up in a WhatsApp group with a small number of other old classmates from school. I tried to warn them about the jabs when the boosters were being rolled out (I'd had two myself before finding out what was going on). None of them would listen and my friend's last words to me - because I withdrew from the WhatsApp group in the end - were 'Sorry, Sheila, but I have complete confidence in vaccination'. My reply was that it wasn't a vaccine. She had been a biology teacher, so probably thought of herself as a 'scientist', which I wasn't. She was the fittest, most active person I've ever known, but 6 months later I was at her funeral. It was a bizarre feeling, learning out of the blue that she'd had a catastrophic heart attack - I was both shocked and not shocked at all, because of what I knew.
I am very sorry to hear of your loss in these unbearable circumstances ... I tried voicing my concerns to people -- some listened, many disregarded or cancelled me. It's execrable. Thank you for commenting.
My sincere condolences to you over your loss of a dear friend. As I read this I am filled with anticipatory grief as I expect the grim hand of jab inflicted mortality to reach out and take many away into a too early passing away.
I am then tempted to avoid the pain of yet more loss, by not letting myself bond with people to begin with, by being detatched and 'cool'.
But I am hopelessly human and so will shed many tears.
Let's hope it won't turn out so bad ... though already it's been disastrous enough. Stay strong and thank you for sharing.
Yes, I agree.
As the old addage goes -
"Prepare for the worst and hope for the best"
Another beautifully written piece! Thank you Manny! Sorry to hear of your loss but tis the stuff of our time. When death becomes a regular unquestioned occurrence of the young but also the healthy middle/older person we know we are in for the long haul! A famous Australian politician died suddenly this wk after his morning exercise in Berlin whilst on a business trip. The tributes said nothing of possible cause of death or a mention of autopsy to determine. This is the new kind of reporting around death...if we don’t ask then we won’t know! Things are out of control!
Thank you so much for your kind words and for taking the time to comment. 'don't ask, don't know' -- is that a new catchphrase for our time????
Yep that's a very apt term...or another one "go along to get along"...sad state of affairs
Emanuel, what you have written is in the nature of a long poem, something magnificently expressive and poignant. Farewells are painful things, but you sent off your friend with warmth and courtesy. I am very sorry for the loss you are feeling. Alongside grief there will come memories, lovely memories, more precious now because they will be tinged with this newer shade. There's been an ending but also not an ending because there will exist the reliving of the important moments, the fun moments, and the revelatory moments that will surface for you to remember.
And, Emanuel, thank you for what you have written about memory, that it is an amalgam drawn across the lifespan which within it conceals other memories and leads to new insights. I think yours is a humanistic description befitting the humans that we are, we with our mysterious and active mind. You are offering a defense of memory, the perfect answer to those who attack the power and importance of memory, be it conscious, repressed, suppressed, or recalled. The duality of the mind is its ability to mix science with humanism, a complex mixture that swims in our quadrillion of synapses. How does it all happen?
thank you so much for your beautiful comment and your lovely observations