"In the middle of the trek of our life..."

Hello, darlings (and others)!

First, I want to acknowledge that I haven't been responding to each and every comment as I like and intend (and sometimes manage) to do. Please know I read and appreciate yours though!

I'm sitting on the front porch at 6:30 a.m. with a blanket over my legs. It's been a bit cooler lately: a relief after many days this summer up around 90ºF/ 32 ºC, and plenty humid. 
(That's pretty normal for Minnesota, actually, which gets very hot in the summer and very cold in the winter. The worst of both!)

I'm feeling very well, physically––much stronger after biking regularly for a couple months, and able to go faster than my usual slow pedal in the high heat.

Is sweating good for you?
It feels like it is, doesn't it?
I looked it up, and it is. It washes out toxins and prevents the spread of disease-causing bacteria. Not, alas, viruses, but exercising to the point of sweating is healthy, so I'm good there, biking.

I've never had a driver's license, so I've mostly had to walk or bike (or bus) for transportation. When I was young, my main motive was financial: I did the math and was shocked at how many hours I'd have to work to pay for a car so I could drive it to work...
It seemed a bad trade.

Not driving has limited my life in some ways. I'm not the mobile American. I can't leave town on a whim. I don't buy things I can't transport on my bike, or if I do, I have to ask a friend for a ride.

But it's a freedom too! I'm more mobile in some ways, not being freighted with a lot of stuff.
And not-driving has kept my body in motion, and now that I'm almost 60 (a phrase I'm saying a lot lately, getting used to it), I'm grateful I made that choice long ago when it was physically easier. 

I know I'd rely on a car, if I had one. I've never been great at exercising for its own sake. It's better if I am forced to move to get places and to do my work. 

Working at home for fifteen years was the worst--I only ever had to roll out of bed and walk across the room to the laptop to do my publishing/editing tasks.
At the thrift store, I'm moving and lifting for hours.

And with Covid, I'm staying off public transport, so I'm biking more than usual. The 10 miles round-trip to work is twice my usual distance.
 (If not for Covid, I'd probably have taken the bus on the hottest days. That's a bad deal though: waiting at a bus stop is worse than biking, when at least you generate a little cooling breeze.)

I'm trying to take better care of myself in general--I'm also eating a bit healthier (a little bit, anyway). 
I'd hate to get sick now and have to interrupt this roll I'm on.

I'm writing about this because I'm going to get tested for Covid this morning--the clinic is just off the bike path on the way to work. 

On Monday we learned the boss is self-isolating because a visiting family member of his tested positive. 
Plus, the city had asked people to get tested if they'd been in public protests after the police murdered George Floyd. I'd been in crowds a lot, so I'd called for a test in early June, but hung up after a half-hour wait with no answer.

This time I did the sensible thing and filled out an online form. They emailed right back and gave me a 5-day window to come into a clinic for testing, no need to schedule a time.
Handy.

Meanwhile I told friends that I can't see them in person, even here on this big porch--something we've all relaxed about.
Now, again, I feel nervous about possibly being a carrier. 

I want to know where I am, even if it's only for this minute. 
Once the store opens, it'll be a whole new ballgame. We were supposed to open on Saturday, in two days--don't see how that's going to happen now. The store is still a mess.
 
If I should test positive, at least I could isolate in this nice, big house where I'm cat sitting. At my place, I'd have to stay in my room. Or outside.

This pandemic is going to be a pain here in the cold winter, isn't it. 
If it's too snowy and icy, I won't be able to bike. I could walk... It's only 2.5 miles from my place to work. Still, if it's snowy, that can be a heavy slog.

Yeah... so, I'm almost sixty. Things have definitely gotten weird––not just in my life, but in all our lives. 
I feel weird.
Am I having a midlife crisis, or would I feel this weird anyway?
It's a confluence, I think.

Death--specifically the fact that I am going to die--has never felt so real. It's not just Covid that makes death more real, it's having been repeatedly at the site where men snuffed out the life of another man: 
How easy it is to put out the light, forever. 

For societies too. How quickly things can fall apart.
This isn't all bad of course:

We could take this opportunity to be the heroes of our own lives!

(Like David Copperfield.)

But it is weird (weird, weird, weird) to feel the ground beneath my feet so unstable. Not that I'm alone of course––now or in history. 
We're in good company.

Dante came to mind last night--the only lines of his I know.
(Seamus Heaney's translation. Someone else translates it, "the trek of our life", which as a Trekkie I like.) 

“In the middle of the journey of our life
I found myself astray in a dark wood
where the straight road had been lost sight of."

I'd add, the road was never straight anyway, it just appeared that way.

. . . On we go.