The 2021 Variant - The Year We All Said Would Be Better

 I reread my 2020 year end blog before starting to write my new one for 2021.   I ended last year in isolation, staying at home, and being anxious about Covid.   The vaccines were not quite available yet.  It was scary to even think about going out any place.   I started the new year with hopes of getting a vaccine and getting my life back to normal.   I soon realized I had no idea what normal was any more. We were not getting a new year.   It was going to be 2020 the 21 variant.  

I grew a Covid beard in 2020 and had planned to clean it up in the new year.  But we never really got that new year and the beard remains.   I have kept it trimmed and not long.  But this is still a first for me and I have grown to appreciate it.  I have a feeling it will still be here at the end of 2022 also.  

2019 

2020

2021

I spent most of January and February still in lock down but not just because of Covid.  Our dog Tallulah had been hit by a car in December 2020.   She had surgery on December 23, 2020 and the emergency vet tried to save her front leg.   We brought her home on Christmas Eve 2020.   She was under complete sedation and was not supposed to move at all.   We found out eight weeks later that the surgery was not successful and she would need her front leg amputated.  So I remained at home with her for her recovery from the amputation which was just as well as I had not received a my Covid shot yet and should not have been out anyway.

Me with Tallulah in recovery

My daughters and Mark were all concerned that I should get my Covid Vax as soon as I was eligible.  My age group was opened in March for the shot.   Katie drove me down to the Raven's Football stadium where the state of Maryland was doing mass vaccinations.   

Johnny Unitas Memorial masked up at Mass Vaccination site.

I was glad to get the vaccination hoping it would allow me to get back to some sort of normalcy.  But as I mentioned above I was soon to find out I still had no idea what normal really was any more.  Three days after getting the vaccine I woke up to find that I had no sense of taste of smell.  I knew what that meant!  I had Covid.  I went to the nearest test location at my local CVS Pharmacy to do a drive through test.  One day later I had my response.  I tested positive for Covid.  This was certainly not part of my plane.  I was still home with a recuperating dog and now I was concerned about getting ill from Covid.  I was very fortunate.  My case was very mild, thanks to the vaccine I had taken right before being diagnosed.  I had no other symptoms other than no taste or smell.  No fever.  No weakness.  And within the week my taste and smell has returned.  But we still had to stay quarantined for a full ten days.  I spoke with my personal physician by way of a Zoom meeting.  He said I could assume I caught it while in line for the shot at the mass distribution site and that in his opinion my vaccination worked because I had such a light case.

April the fourth was a big day for me this year.  I felt some sense of things returning to some kind of normal.   

I was a fully vaccinated Covid surviving member of society and I returned to favorite bar, Racers, and had my first beer back inside the bar.  

Now for the next big step.  Mark was finally qualified to be vaccinated.  So now we were wondering if we would be to do some traveling.   Nothing big, nothing out of the country.  We had really wanted to go to Hawaii again but that was just not possible.  So instead I found a wonderful beach rental on the Outer Banks.  Tallulah was doing well with only three legs but we could not see ourselves leaving her at a kennel just yet.  Luckily the house I found to rent had handicap access ramps.  It was perfect.  

Tallulah loved the beach house and spent a lot of time on the deck watching the neighbors.   This had to be one of our best vacations in a long time.  We were still somewhat isolated but it could not have been more relaxing.  

We were able to do some more local traveling in September over the Labor Day weekend.   Oh how we wanted it to be Hawaii again but that still just was not happening for us.  Plane travel was still sketchy.  People were fighting on planes over mask mandates.  Flight schedules were not dependable.  And honestly Hawaii was not being too open to tourists returning yet anyway and who can blame them.  And due to the unvaccinated Covid just kept growing.  After some initial Google searches we were able to find a log cabin to rent in New Hampshire in the same area we vacationed in 2020.   So the 2021 varient year of 2020 continued for us.  

We enjoyed New England as much this year as we did in 2020.  And the blending of the years continued.  Writing now it's difficult to remember did that happen in 2020 or was it 2021.  It's almost liked we have blotted out 2020 and just jumped from 2019 right into 2021.  It's still difficult even going through photos to tell the story of this year to differentiate what happened and when.   And to make it even more bizarre I am currently researching plans for a return this spring to New England.  

We found out that Tallulah does travel well.  She managed the both trips in the car with no real issues.  She was more relaxed than at home. At home she is on constant guard duty guarding our house and yard growling and barking at everything and anything that moves.  But on the vacations she seemed to be on vacation also.  She ignored most of the dogs at the rest stops.  She did not bark at any of the neighboring vacationers at either location.  She pretty much became a some what normal dog.  And then we returned home and she went back to her self appointed guard dog duties.  

Tallulah on vacation from guard dog duty

Our isolated cabin in Eidelweiss Village New Hampshire

Our cabin was isolated and on a dirt road.  We were surround by beautiful lakes, trails, mountains and wild turkeys!  The only time Tallulah got really animated was when a large group of wild turkeys decided to visit out yard.   She also got a little agitated one evening and the next morning I saw a paw print that might have been from a small bear in our back yard.   But other than the wild life there was nothing there bother us and we had one of our most relaxed vacations in years.  We hiked.  We photographed lakes. We saw lighthouses and cliff climbers.  We drove to Maine and my daughter from Massachusetts drove up to see us for a day also.   

Portland Maine Lighthouse

Cliff climbers at Cathedral Ledge

The year progressed to a slow end by December.  I saw some friends get sick.  I saw some friends die.  I got angry at Covid.  I got angry at the unvaxxed who continue to make this pandemic a political argument while I tried to avoid political arguments.  And I spent a lot of time at my local bar.     Day drinking at Racers was my one refuge.   With Covid and the restrictions, depleted staff,  and the general malaise of the year they survived.  Many places closed permanently.  Some closed temporarily.   But my favorite bar survived.   Monday mornings this was where you would find me.  It was never crowded.  There was no real concern of getting infected from people who were not there.  It was just me and my bartenders this year.  Roxy, Mariam, Bernard, John, Eric, and Brooks kept me entertained and hopefully I didn't bore them too much with my old man stories.   And I thank the manager Emily for her kindness to an old man with free tickets to a local beer event this year and many free samples of the newest beers on draft. And Monday regulars Lou, Chris, Roger all properly vaxxed.  All feeling safe.  And all glad for the escape.   They all helped me keep my sanity this year.  

Colorful beers in a black and white world - Racers - The 2021 Varient

 

Ending this year I am glad t to have had my family together all at the same time over the Christmas holidays this.   I am grateful for the vaccinations and the boosters being available. I am thankful they are all vaccinated and have received their boosters.  I am thankful to have survived a very minor Covid infection.   I am thankful for a year with strong leadership from our President and no longer going to bed angry or fearful each night from the actions of his predecessor.  And I am looking forward to a new year.  Will it be 2020 variant 22 this year?   Will we all adjust to the new normal?  It's difficult to say.  I do know I will miss those good friends and family who did not survive this year.  I dread hitting the big 70 this year but grateful to have been able to make it this far. 

And Tallulah is looking forward to another vacation from her guard duties and returning to her mountain retreat.

Pollyanna Days in New Hampshire - Visiting Littleton and Meredith

 

I saw the movie Pollyanna starring Haley Mills at the movies in 1960.  I was eight years old.  I loved the movie and was so sad at the ending.  SPOILER ALERT - The cheerful Pollyanna falls from a tree and can not walk at the end of the movie.  Haley Mills starred as Pollyanna and won a special childrens Oscar for the movie.  Pollyanna was always the optimist.  Pollyanna had been taught by her father how to play the "glad game", in which the goal is to find something to be glad about whether it's a disappointing Christmas gift or a life long illness.

If any year needed a Pollyanna attitude it's been 2020.   And little did I know at the beginning of this year that I would end up in Littleton, New Hampshire the home of the author of  Pollyanna.   Mark and I had big travel plans for 2020.  We were planning a trip to Sweden in the spring to visit Mark's cousin.  And hopefully a trip to New Castle, England for a meeting with our Virtual Tourist friends.  And maybe even a fall trip back to our beloved Hawaii. Instead we were hit with Covid and quarantines. And then my daughter lost her job due to Covid budget contraints.  And a few weeks she was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease.   So Pollyanna, where is the glad game in all of those?  There was not a lot to be happy about presently.   

Then the good news amidst the quarantine blues started to appear.  My younger daughter who had also been unemployed for almost a year received a job offer in Boston.  So she and her wife put their home on the market.  Packed up their belongings, three dogs and three cats, and moved from Atlanta to Boston in the heart of the quarantine.  About a month later my older daughter was offered a temporary job in New Hampshire.  The company set her up in a fully furnished log cabin isolated on a dirt road in the northern New Hampshire town of Lancaster.  The thought of her moving there for six month with the recent Crohns disease diagnosis certainly was not the part of any glad game for me.  

I traveled to New Hampshire with Katie the last part of June for her job interview.  I had only been to New Hampshire one time previously and that was almost ten years ago.  Little did I know that this year I would end up in New Hampshire three times including the job interview trip.  I also had no idea that Mark and I both would fall in love with New Hampshire.  

We loved the cabin.  It was large and accommodating.   The views from the side porch were breath taking.  We got watch the early morning sun rise over Mount Washington.  And then in the evening we got to see the beautiful sunsets as well.   

We got to visit two beautiful little towns on this trip.  Littleton and Meredith, New Hampshire.  Littleton calls itself "The Glad Town" because of it connection to the author of Pollyanna.  And it truly is a glad town.  There is a memorial to the character Pollyanna in front of the library.   The crosswalks all have Pollyanna emblems painted on them.  They instruct you to stop, look, and wave. .  And the minute you step off the curb all the traffic stops for you and you really do feel like smiling and waving.

We took turns posing with the Pollyanna statue.  It was a vacation after all and we were tourists kind of, although Katie is now a resident.

I was in such a Glad Game mood I even posed with the umbrella's at the Pollyanna Gateway.

I visited Littleton on all three of my  trips to New Hampshire this summer.  Why three times to the same little town?  Well other than it being the "glad city" it also has a brewery that I really liked a lot.  Perhaps one of my favorites I have ever visited.   It's the Shilling Brewery.  It's located in an old mill sitting on a hill over the Connecticut River.  Now here is a glad game face with one of their excellent beers.

They also had excellent wood fired pizza and one of the best pretzels anywhere.

And there was plenty of out door seating for a safe and social distancing experience.

Littleton is large by northern New Hampshire standards but in reality it is only a town of 5,920 people.  So it's truly a small town.   But there is a lot to see and do there on a visit.

You can take a leisurely stroll along the Connecticut River.

Take photos of the beautiful covered bridge.

You can visit the Guiness Book of World Records longest candy counter at Chutters General Store.

Try some Poutine made from french fries, cheese curds, and brown gravy.  It tastes a lot better than it sounds.

Or you can just be a nasty tourist and leave your Covid mask on a table for someone else to clean up for you.   

If I returned to New Hampshire again any time soon I would go back to Littleton.  I enjoyed it that much.

I want to mention another small town in New Hampshire here also.  Meredith, New Hampshire.  It's about 45 miles south of Littleton.  

Meredith is a small resort town.  It's a little larger than Littleton with a population of 6,241.  It is located in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire on Lake Winnipesaukee.  I mention it along with Littleton because it is the home to another fictional hero of mine.   The author of the Archie comic books lived in Meredith, New Hampshire.  And there is a statue to commemorate Archie in the town square.  We saw this online and I said I have to go see this.  I loved the Archie comics as a preteen.  The statue of Archie sets on bench staring across the street to the work shop where he was created.

The lake area is beautiful.  There are several bars, restaurants and hotels in Meredith.  We were there on a warm sunny day and the lake front was crowded.  For social distancing precautions we did not visit any of the bars or restaurants while there.  But I would like to return and check some out after we are over this Covid mess.  

There are some fun sculptures along the water front also.

I will be writing more about our time in New Hampshire.  I  never thought of it as a vacation destination.  But Covid and Pollyanna's Glad Game changed my opinion.

Here I am back at home.  Writing my blog and wearing my Pollyanna Glad Game tee shirt for inspiration.   Take that Covid.