Colds and flus and ebola...oh my!

by BC
(St. Louis, MO)

Well, cold and flu season is upon us, and hardly anyone I know has not been affected, my family included. What a horrible time of year to be ill! I’m hoping this year will not bring a repeat performance of last year when my husband and I both were bedridden on Christmas Day. We have all been sick—(some more than once)—in the past month to six weeks. I am hoping we can use the time off from work and school to regenerate our immune systems before we go back and confront all of the nasty bugs again!

In other news, the country seems to have escaped an all-out Ebola epidemic. I read an op-ed the other day, which accused the CDC and the NIH of creating a panic so they could receive additional funding to “fight Ebola.” We Westerners are all safe and comfy in our American cocoon while nearly 8,000 western Africans have died in the epidemic. We are exceptionally blessed to live in this country. What better time of year to rejoice in our many blessings?

It caused me to consider how I’d react if I were living in a region being decimated by an epidemic. Access to food might be scarce; people might not be willing to travel to their jobs. Would we have gas to power our cars and our homes? Would we continue to have electricity? It made me grateful for the deer meat we have stored in our freezer and for the additional way to prepare food…using the solar oven. Although the dreadful weather lately might not yield very tasty results of the deer in said solar oven!