"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans" - John Lennon, "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)", 1980
Doug and I have been surfing the unexpected for a while now - we expected to wait until we retired to hit the road, we expected to move into a fifth wheel towable, we expected moving out of our house to be a lot less complex.
On the road, some of our unexpecteds have been lovely. In Houston, we visited a local park one lunchtime, and a group of firefighters practicing for a softball tournament welcomed Doug onto their field:
Other unexpecteds weren't so wonderful, like running into a low roof extension and cracking open our Togo Roadlink.
Some unexpecteds weren't really unexpected. Doug was surprised at the systems that failed or were incorrectly installed on our new RV, but I had been taking in enough articles/podcasts/vlogs that I knew of many stories of new rigs with issues, so I was disappointed but not shocked to become one of those stories. We also not-so-unexpectedly found that driving closer to 55mph really does improve your gas mileage, just like the experts all said back in the 1970's.
But the unexpecteds in March 2020 have defied everyone's expectations. "Social distancing", Broadway gone dark, Italy on lockdown, restaurants empty, churches closed - the spread of novel coronavirus and the resulting Covid-19 sicknesses and deaths has produced experiences and anxieties like nothing in my lifetime. On Sunday, friends at our home church in Virginia practiced passing the peace with a peace sign rather than a handshake; on Monday, our younger daughter's New York college announced it was immediately moving to online classes and we scrambled to get her onto a flight to join us in Texas; on Tuesday, the news reported that an entire country, Italy, had placed itself on lockdown to try to stem the spread of the virus; on Wednesday, the NBA became the first of the major sports leagues to suspend its season, and Hollywood actors Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson reported they were sick with Covid-19; on Thursday, Disney announced the worldwide closure of its remaining open theme parks, Broadway made plans to shutter all shows, and Europeans were told they would be denied entry to the U.S.; on Friday, Virginia joined five other states plus Washington DC plus large portions of Washington and California in closing their public and private schools, the stock market continued its pinball performance, museums from the Louvre to the Smithsonian to the Getty started closing their doors, and the president declared a National Emergency.
The RV world has not been untouched. The FMCA (Family Motor Coach Association) has canceled its March gathering; New Mexico has closed its state parks to overnight camping; at least one RV vlog did an episode on "bugging out" to remote spots to avoid the coronavirus.
We are fortunate: Doug's and my parents are in their 80's, but with few underlying conditions that would place them in the most vulnerable demographic; we both already are employed in jobs that can be done remotely, and aren't in danger of losing income from the virus's economic fallout; we live in a country where there is still time for "social distancing" to "flatten the curve" of exponential virus spread and sickness; technology allows us to stay in touch with our older daughter in Massachusetts and our friends back in Virginia.
We may no longer be a permanent part of a rooted community, but Doug and I feel strongly that we are still part of the larger community, and as such have obligations to our "neighbor" - to be more conscious of staying in touch, to look for opportunities to help those who will be struggling, to keep ourselves healthy and safe so that we can be available to help others.
When the unexpected becomes the unprecedented, we all are called upon to be our best selves, wherever we travel. May it be so.
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