Obscured

Yesterday, Illinois’ shelter-in-place order was extended to the end of May. I can’t say that I’m terribly surprised by this and I can’t say that I’m not saddened that we still have more than a month of this at the very least. But I understand. Things aren’t where we need them to be to begin thinking about getting back to “normal.” Not even close. So another month of social distancing it shall be.

When I was processing this picture, it made me think of how it relates to our current situation. The budding branches of this willow tree only give hints at what lies beyond. I think one of the aspects of this whole situation that has been most frustrating for me and for many others is the uncertainty of what lies ahead. We occasionally gets glimpses but it’s hard to extrapolate that out to something that is anything more than a guess.

A related further frustration about the whole thing is that there is no shortage of those making prognostications about everything — the virus, treatments of it, economic fallout, political ramifications, etc. etc. ad nauseam. The truth is that no one has enough data at the moment to really offer any kind of meaningful predictions to that end. We’re only starting to get glimpses of what’s beyond. Even those using our tried and true tools of science can’t get a solid picture of where we’re going.

And those refraining from using those tools have even less of a clue; yet that doesn’t seem to stop them from bloviating about it all. This latter group includes media outlets and politicians. That seems beyond ill advised to me. It borders on immoral. To that end, I’ve really dialed back my intake of Coronavirus news and try to stick to informational sources that deal in fact based science.

I’m not sure when we’ll get back to normal. I’m not even sure what “normal” will be on the other side. For now, I’ll just keep staying the course, and try to figure out what’s beyond when the wind blows the branches enough to get a new glimpse that I couldn’t see before.