Brief catchup. I did the tasting at the distillery in Wick. Then did my bucket list tasting straight from the cask at the Strathisla distillery the next day. Turns out that they discontinued my favorite, Strathisla 12 year, so I bought two of their discontinued bottles. Then I spent my last day buying a few more bottles, tested negative for covid, then went to a few bars before catching a few hours of sleep before my flight home.
The first flight was from Inverness to Manchester. It was a long process with rechecking bags, but I made it to the flight to JFK. However, just before, the flight, my travel companion messaged me a picture of his positive Covid-19 test demonstrating that he had been infected with SARS-CoV-2. I wore my N95 mask diligently for the remainder of that day, which turned out to be long, with a missed connection at JFK due to a late flight, and learning about the free hotel hours later after spending hours with a headache walking between terminals with my suitcases in below freezing weather, finally reaching the hotel and making myself eat and shower before sleeping a few hours, and finally catching the flight home, at which point I had begun to more strongly feel symptoms beyond the headaches of the previous day. Cough, mild congestion, the signs of the common cold. I texted my mom, advising her to wear her N95 mask when she picked me up, and she instead wore a surgical mask. I kept my mask on. Every time I tried to tell her about the trip, I would begin coughing, so the car ride became silent, though she offered to take me out to eat. I had to decline because at that point, I knew that there was a fair chance that my breath could kill people. We got home and I had the relief of taking my mask off in my room. Shortly thereafter, I went to get tested, and sure enough, I did indeed test positive. So I packed up a partially unpacked bag and drove to my mother's Airbnb in Canton, which is where I have been all week. Symptoms have thankfully been mild, with the worst hitting on Tuesday, which was the fourth day of symptoms, at which point I began taking anti-cough and anti-diarrhea medicine, which solved most of the issues.
I was just reading about the psychological impact of post-pandemic life and how it will take adjusting. We will not be done overnight, and the psychological traumas of these experiences will stay with some of us for years to come. I do not know if I can or should ever remove the shadow that has been cast upon the character of those I once respected who were so willing to endanger the lives of those around them simply because of "freedom". My father who was proud of me getting an education, yet clearly had no respect for that education once it became relevant to the situation concerning which he had already decided that he was an expert. The same father who, when his father died from the virus, continually seemed blinded to the point of trying to repeat the same mistakes of gatherings that killed him in the first place. And the stepmom who, after demonstrating a lack of support for my fervently expressed wishes that they comply with public health guidance, said to me with a big smile "We are your biggest supporters". My oldest brother who, when asking me to show him the studies to back my claims, and to whom I replied that he can trust me because I am a doctor, denied that I was a doctor and said that I had studied at my mother's house. The church leaders who advertised large maskless gatherings at a time when vaccines were not prevalent, or who promoted a demagogue in an election simply on the principle that their conservative views were being empowered politically. The sister who was exposed to this deadly disease at a holiday party and would not move from the common room into a private room to isolate because she "didn't feel like it", thus driving me to move out for periods of time. And of course, throughout it all, the constant changing of minds that seemed to be based not on any rational form of logic, but rather on simply doing something other than what official guidance suggested. Wear masks at all times until those are the official guidelines, at which point switch back to being against them, or only wear them as prescribed rather than rationally thinking about situations in which viral spread would be most likely.
It was during this time that I began to reconsider some of my previous views on people, on humanity. To some extent, I know that my judgments here are limited to Americans, as this individualistic culture is clearly birthing the worst sort of people. People in general are bad, in my view. Self-interests ultimately reign supreme, though they certainly mean well and can feel justified in their actions. But well-wishes somehow do not overcome their politicized reasoning behind not putting on a mask or getting vaccinated. That is my feeling toward the general population. Within my own family, I can confidently say that I only think that throughout this pandemic, I am the only one that I trusted in the slightest to maintain rational thought and reason. Out of five of us siblings, what that tells me is that there should not be more of us. So whatever desire I had to eventually have offspring has changed into a bit of a responsibility to prevent such progeny from coming to be. I recognize that we were also raised a certain way, but with a sister, an aunt, and a grandma who all potentially have some form of narcissistic personality disorder, one has to begin to assume that there could be something very wrong with the psychological profile of our family tree, and I do not want to risk it any further.
I allowed myself to like a girl during this pandemic. That too taught me something, mostly that my brain cannot handle a romantic relationship. It certainly helped that the feelings were unrequited. My social anxieties might have turned into a shy and playful quirk a decade ago in the dating world, but enough of me has become rigid and moody that I do not think that it could happen. That alone is a significant reason. Then add in the fact that I am currently uncertain within my faith, in large part due to the aforementioned ethical betrayals of Christian leaders, and how very specific a type of person I am, and I just do not see me finding that person. And frankly, I no longer crave it quite like I once did. To be clear, that could be a form of denialism, but for the moment at least, it is certainly the sentiment with which I most strongly resonate.
I have hardly read my Bible over the past year, whereas it was previously essentially a daily routine. This is a habit that I would like to resume. It became distasteful to me when it became so tied to nationalism in the domestic terrorist attack at the nation's capitol last year, and in the midst of grieving the loss of my grandfather the month after, I lost all of that drive. Even at this point, I am realizing that grieving his loss really took a lot out of me, even thinking of my academic track, and perhaps I do not need to be quite so hard on myself. In any case, I used to say to myself that for me, saying that God does not exist is like denying that your own parents exist. It is a fact, regardless of how uncomfortable it happens to make you. I am far more eager to connect with my heavenly father than the other one. One guides me whereas the other one mansplains medicine to me, one who earned a doctorate in the subject.
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