burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

Fri Oct 6, my housemate tested positive for covid.

This morning (Tues Oct 24) she finally started testing negative!

I've been cadence testing most of this time, and have continued to test negative. (She's been masking in common spaces and mostly staying in her room. I was actually a bit grateful to be obligated to be on-campus for work MTW so I wasn't in the house much. Plus, that first Friday night through Mon Oct 9 I was at Abby's; and then Abby and I were out of town together Thurs Oct 19 - Mon Oct 23.)

Last Friday after work I posted a photo to FB of me sitting outside a CVS vaccination area with boxes of skeletons behind me and said, "Seasonally vaxxed."

I know people who are waiting for Novavax (some people literally can't get mRNA -- or get much worse side effects from mRNA than from protein-based --- and others think protein-based will have a better chance against new mutations than the highly specific mRNA), but I'm traveling to my best friend's wedding on Oct 20, so I'd like to be fully baked for that.  This was also basically the only weekend until Indigenous Peoples' weekend that we didn't have much scheduled, so I booked a booster for after work on Friday -- in case it wiped me out like it sometimes has before.  (I also bundled in my flu shot -- though I know there are arguments to wait until later in the season to get it so you have peak immunity during peak flu season .. which is maybe why work's free flu clinic is usually in October?)

I was seriously wiped out for over a week when I got covid last fall (plus miserable for a day before I got Paxlovid), so I would really like to not repeat that experience -- plus also I would like to reduce the likelihood of getting long covid, etc.

Lol, last Monday, my new roommate messaged me that her co-teacher had tested positive for covid.  But that week she masked in the house and mostly stayed in her room. And this week at least 2 coworkers (like on my floor) have stayed home due to covid in their households. Love this surge.

Last Wednesday, a friend posted a CNN link:

US households can order four free tests from Covidtests.gov starting September 25.

So, FYI in case you'd missed that news.

***

This booster did not, in fact, wipe me out.  Friday night, I went to bed and felt achy, and woke up every couple hours.  I wasn't overly tired on Saturday, though I did have a headache.  I realized after I'd gone to bed Friday night that I think I'm supposed to drink lots of water after a shot, which I hadn't gone out of my way to do.

Heading to bed Saturday night, I felt chills.  Which subsided by the time I actually went to bed.  I woke up a couple hours later when Abby came to bed and I was over-warm and maybe had a touch of a fever?  But I mostly slept through the night.

Sunday I felt mostly okay.

Monday morning I felt a little unwell -- a little tummy upset and maybe fever.

I think I'm pretty solidly back to normal by now?

After climbing for the first time since ~lockdown with Meagan S. the morning of June 1st, I went climbing with thedeadparrot for the first time since ~lockdown the following Thursday (June 10th), after work.

I wasn't sure how much of it was because it was evening rather than morning, or residual from the heat wave earlier that week, or what -- but I definitely had way less energy than when I'd climbed with Meagan S. I was clearly tired on my third wall -- but I realized afterward that I did do 5 walls (two 7s, one 8, and two 9s), so not bad. I was definitely sore the next day.

The next Thursday (June 17th), I climbed 6 walls (two 7s, two 8s, two 9s -- though in varying orders). I definitely don't have the stamina that I used to have -- which makes sense. I noticed my hands starting to callous again, though.

Thursday, June 24th, my 3rd climbing with D, I only did 5 walls, but I did a newly-set route (so IDK what grade) that felt challenging, but in a good way. Like, I'm still regaining the stamina (and strength) I used to have, but I keep being reminded that I have retained a lot of the bodily intuition.

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Our climbing gym, if you give them proof of vaccination, gives you a single-use colored bracelet (like the ones at clubs to indicate if you're legal to buy alcohol) for your visit to indicate that you don't have to wear a mask in the gym.

D's still not comfortable not wearing a mask indoors (even though she's fully vaxxed), whereas I'm happy to get to take my mask off to climb but feel really weird biking home without a mask on (and also wear a mask to bike to the gym).

This feels very much like because I'd been biking all pandemic, feeling judgy of people who were out unmasked, putting myself and others at risk -- and so I feel like I'm being That Person if I'm biking without a mask on; strangers don't know if I'm vaccinated versus being anti-vax/anti-mask.

That said: Last Monday (June 28th) I did a CVS errand and felt very weird about the fact that almost no one else was wearing a mask. Like, I know the mask mandate has been lifted, but I'm also like, "But unless there's a clear vaccine exemption, people wear masks indoors."

(For context: We were at about 68% of MA having gotten at least their first vaccine shot when I started climbing again, and have crept up to 70% -- second-highest vaccination rate in the nation [scroll down here]. You can read more about our risk numbers there or here.)

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Sunday June 13th, my church had an outdoor baptism (for a pandemic baby), so I got to hug a bunch of people. Everyone was masked (since there were lots of kids too young to be vaccinated)

I commented a couple times: "I don't wanna talk about how my pandemic has been; I just wanna hug people."

At Church Council the following Wednesday, we talked about "Draft In Person Worship Guidance," which included:

Masks - All worship attendees are asked to mask for the first two weeks of outdoor worship (7/4 and 7/11) as we learn new routines and get comfortable being around one-another again. For the rest of the summer, we request that unvaccinated adults (12+) continue to mask and that others mask based on their comfort level.

Physical contact - We are a church of huggers! It has been a long time since we’ve been able to experience physical contact during the passing of the peace, and many of us are looking forward to that hug or handshake. We must remember that comfort levels with physical contact have substantially changed for many people; please do not assume that because you could previously hug or shake hands that will be ok now. Please renew enthusiastic consent every time! There will be no passing of the peace during summer worship.

The idea re: masking the first 2 weeks is to let people try out this new thing at the highest level of safety/comfort.

We had our first outdoor worship service this morning (hybrid with Zoom), and since we're not doing a Passing of the Peace, there was definitely an element of, "Are we allowed to hug people here?" but it mostly felt okay? Like, I definitely asked/was asked by some people re: hugs before and after service, and so I got to hug a bunch of people.

I think I'm definitely one of those people who has largely been like, "Okay, now that I have decided that Activity X is safe-enough-for me, resuming it feels really natural." But obviously stuff still throws me. So IDK how I'll experience stuff like our (now probably mid-August?) return-to-office, or my likely flight to Florida in August to visit the niblings.

I got my second dose of Pfizer on Monday around 5pm.

Thom and I used my Vax+Shop coupon to get Cold Stone and ate it across the street in the Christian Science Center by the children's fountain -- and took a selfie and sent it to my friend Holly :) (who used to live in the area and had suggested we have our ice cream at the reflecting pool).

We came home and had dinner and went to bed at like 9:15pm. (Thom was exhausted, and I was tired, so I rested for a while while she slept next to me.) I woke up around 1am with chills/shakes for like 2 hours and then kept waking up maybe every hour-ish to stretch/move my aching body and get up and pee and check on my low-grade nausea. Thom was working from my place on Tuesday to baby me if necessary, but mostly I just stayed in bed all day. Like, I did not shower with her, but I did get up to have breakfast with her -- I ate like 8 saltines -- and read the Internet next to her at the dining room table until like 11am, when I went back to bed, where I mostly stayed until this morning (mostly sleeping).

This morning, I considered calling out sick again (I had pre-emptively put in for a sick day yesterday), but figured I would try being a person, and take additional sick time if needed. I showered, got dressed, logged on (so glad to be WFH rn), did some work, ate some food (yogurt and more saltines, yay).

I have a little bit of a headache, but the body aches and low-grade nausea mostly seem gone. Just tired still.

***

Pfizer's been approved for 12-15 year-olds, and Children's Hospital emailed Thom on Tuesday to schedule an appointment for their 15-year-old \o/ So Den gets shot #1 this Friday and shot #2 on June 4th, so our whole pod has full immunity on June 18th.

MA adjusted their guidelines again, so as of Monday of this week, a BMI over 25 (i.e., "overweight") gets you eligible.  (If you already pre-registered for a mass vaccine site, though, you can't edit what you said to indicate your change in eligibility status. Sigh.)

It still feels super like lying to me to say "Yes" to "I hereby attest under the penalties of perjury to the best of my knowledge and belief that I have 1 or more of the medical conditions specified by Massachusetts that put me at increased risk of severe illness from COVID-19," though -- even though technically I know it isn't.

Anyway, I haven't been super aggressive about trying to get myself an appointment -- both because CVS appointments drop at midnight; and also because we still have classes for a few more weeks, so I don't feel like I can actually take an appointment at any date/time anywhere in the area.  This is apparently only causing Thom a little bit of stress 😂

But Thom got shot #1 today, her older kid gets shot #1 tomorrow, and Colleen gets shot #1 the day after that.  And my housemate's partner gets his first shot next week.

My usual work commute is about 4.5 miles and it takes me about 35-40 minutes to bike it.  (There are a lot of traffic lights.)  So I'm used to doing ~9mi/day (sometimes a little bit more if my evening activities are off my usual commute route, but that usually didn't add a lot of mileage to my commute).

After we moved to WFH, I attempted to simulate my commute by going about halfway and then coming back. (I don't get to indoor rock climb during quarantine, but I wanted to give my body most of the physical activity it was used to.)

Then it occurred to me to explore the bike path along the river just north of me.

And then I started doing routes into the more suburban area north of me (as opposed to the more urban areas I'm used to commuting through to my south).

So, I settled on a route that takes me 35-40min round trip.  Which I've actually been doing 3 times a day (pre-work, post-work, and lunch break) most days.  Turns out it's 3.5mi outbound -- so I've been doing 7mi in the time it used to take me to do 4.5 mi because it's such a direct route and there's so much less traffic now.  So I'm doing 21mi most days.

There's also a longer route that takes me about 80-90min and is 6.5mi outbound.  I did that once a day on my staycation last week -- except the really nice Sunday 2 Sundays ago I did it twice.  So I accidentally did 26mi in one day?  Which feels less ridiculous now that I've realized I'm doing 21mi most days.