Angry with Hope

"For every minute you are angry, you lose 60 seconds of happiness." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

As I stood watching the rain pound against the window, I realized that I was angry. The wind matched my temper. It looked furious as it slammed hard against the trees. There were hundreds of black birds flying high. They resembled my mood. I wondered if birds got annoyed the way we humans do.

Why am I upset? I’m upset because we came all the way to New York to spend Easter with our 5-month-old grandson, and Covid robbed us of that precious time. So yes, I am furious at Covid. Have I told you how much I hate Covid? I hate Covid. I haven’t felt so much anger against anything like I feel against Covid. 

It’s incredible how a moment of happiness can shatter like spun sugar in a second. We were together with our kids on Holy Thursday and the morning of Good Friday. We were happy and carefree. My hubby had been sneezing but since he suffers from allergies and there was so much pollen flying around, we didn’t think anything of it. But then my son took out a home Covid test and our joy came crashing down. Even though the test was inconclusive, it was enough to make us fearful. 

Three tests and twenty-four hours later, we knew the bug had caught up with us. So much for vaccines and wearing masks in public places. So much for eating outdoors and keeping social distance. The hateful virus managed to squeeze its way into my hubby. 

I can complain nonstop but what’s the point? I want to go back to how life had been before Covid but there is no going back. I took for granted how easy life had been before everything changed with Covid. And I feel so unbearably sad. But there is no undoing. At this point, there is only moving forward and hope it all gets better.

I have two choices: I can get over what happened or I can choose to be miserable. There are so many people that have lost loved ones. They are the ones that deserve to be angry, not me. I have so much to be thankful for, and yet, I still can’t shake this feeling of disillusionment from my heart.

I have come to realize that Covid is here to stay. Asking it to go away is like asking a cat to grow wings. Therefore, we are going to have to learn to live with it. I just hope there comes a time when Covid is treated like just another cold because the worst part of this experience is to feel like we are lepers, trapped in a jail cell looking out the window, but not being able to be part of the world. 

After the storm passed, I looked out the window and I saw a parade of children walking towards the Aquarium that’s across our hotel. They were all hopping with joy at the anticipation of seeing the sea creatures behind the glass windows. As I stared from my own window at this parade of happy children, dressed in their colorful jackets, I felt my anger fade and be replaced with hope. This too shall pass, I told myself. And I realized that even though I’m angry, I still have hope. 

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