These past two years have been hardest for our country. First the election results which had Joe Biden elected as president and then the conspiracy to  explain a fraudulent count which all states claim there was no fraudulent count, Then the mob attacking the capitol, killing and damaging the capitol even to the idea of hanging the vice president for siding with electoral votes.

Then right after that the Corona Virus cause a pandemic throughout the world shutting down businesses and people dying in hospitals, nursing homes with no end in sight except for scientist looking for answers to create a vaccine to combat the virus now called COVID.

Right after that, the recommended use of mask and what type of mask should be use because it was found that the virus was passed by mouth. Some people decided on their own that it was a hoax created by the government and refused to wear a mask, A lot of those people landed in the hospital with a breathing problem due to the virus affecting their lungs. So, it was a question of when and where you should wear a mask.

The race was on for a vaccine by Pfizer, Johnson and Johnson and others. Scientist had known for years about this coming virus and had been prepared for it, However president Trump waylaid any further test to prepare years before. It wasn’t until the new president freed those companies to continue with the study and how to combat the virus. It wasn’t until 2021 that a vaccine was found, and the country started to immunize itself.

I wrote about the virus so I could explain how we manage to continue to survive the pandemic and the ice storm which wreaked havoc here in San Antonio.

We were able to escape the contamination  because we lived by ourselves and we had decided earlier that we were not going to meet face to face because of the danger of contamination and we would wait for a time when it would be safe. Everybody was being asked to quarantine themselves for fourteen days to see if we would have symptoms of the virus which was hard to breath, fever and other symptoms.

So, after the required amount of time, we followed all the guidelines of wearing masks so we wouldn’t be contaminated by other people. This was a dangerous time because there were many people not wearing any protective measures.  We went through this all year long. But we did want to meet with family besides calling each other. I decided to use a new system called Zoom which allowed us to see each other. Once in a while we would coordinate so we could see everybody regardless of where they lived. This was a good thing because my grandson’s wife was expecting, and we were afraid that she would be contaminated if she went out. So, throughout 2020 we watched each other’s back.

We were not prepared for the Artic blast that brough snow and icy conditions throughout San Antonio and surrounding counties during the start of 2021. The weather forecasters did report the cold front and really, we were ready for it. However, the city electrical system was not. (In 1949 we had a similar storm hit with snow and ice all over. But the people had natural gas space heaters not electric or central heat run by electricity and survived the storm.) There were many people who were affected because electricity was not available. My son survived by using the barbeque pit to warm up and cook, but they ended up at my house because we use the gas stove in the kitchen to warm up. There were no lights at night, so we use mini lights run by batteries and hung from the ceiling in the kitchen to give us some lights while we are eating. There were stories to be told and we bonded with each other. I suspect that there will be a baby boom come next year. Fortunately, a few days later, we were able to get electricity for a few hours and later the whole day. Little by little we thawed out and returned to some normalcy.

Right after that, we received news of the vaccine that was created by Pfizer. We were the first to receive the shots because we fell in the elderly phase. Later, everybody got their first shot. We received the vaccine through the military because of my military retired status and the second shot too because it required two shots for better combat the virus.

I had no idea that a lot of people refused to take the shots because they were afraid of the side effects and also the belief that the vaccine was created by the use of aborted fetus. So, after it was decided to get a booster shot, we went to HEB to get it.

Later, a variant virus came back and affected those that didn’t take the earlier vaccine. We were back to the same predicament when the virus hit earlier in 2020. At this date there are still people who refused the vaccine under religious conflict. The affected people are slowing down due to patients asking their friends and relatives to take the shots, so they won’t wind up in the hospital like them.

We are still wearing our mask when we go out as our family does too. Restaurants and other venues wear the mask when serving us and sanitize the tables before and after. We hope that we will be back to normalcy 3as I have said before.