I’m hurricane trained. Living in Louisiana, I keep a stocked pantry and freezer, grill, generator, propane, gas, and miles of extension cords.

Our new hurricane has a name: Covid. Not really a hurricane, but Covid disrupts lives and is in many ways more challenging.

Hurricanes arrive after days, even weeks, of fair warning, predictions, and time to prepare. But the Covid tracker and forecast science are in their infancy.

• We identify waves after they’ve already made landfall.
• Trackers? Radar? Eyes on a map? We receive news and maps, but they are mostly historical —rise in cases, reported cases —not forecasts.

We’re ready when the hurricane blows in, but Covid catches us off guard. Once it makes landfall, and our plans fall apart, we have less time to pivot and deal.

Covid made landfall on the farm. We’re rescheduling this week’s creative retreat.

Part of me wants to throw a hissy fit and scream at the sky. But I’m mostly calm and panic free, like after a hurricane.

And like after a hurricane, I’m busy with recovery and alternate plans, and figuring out what to do all this food.

Once I complete the initial tasks, I might do some of the things I would do after a hurricane: rewrite that chapter I keep putting off, get the website up and running, read, sleep a little extra, until power (health) is restored.

Hurricane trained, but that doesn’t mean I’m not pitching a few fits in my head, even as I stay open to the lesson of this pattern interrupt.

©Pennie Nichols. All Rights Reserved. 2023.