COVID-19 Update: It's gettin' real lonesome here, y'all…

 So once again I find myself beginning a blog after a long absence. What else is new? But in this case, quite a few things are new. 2020 has not turned out to be the year we thought it was going to be.

Probably the biggest thing that happened was the coronavirus. It affected everyone, everywhere, though all differently. We haven't had a pandemic in many, many years, and it seems like a lot of people don't know how or aren't willing to stay safe, for themselves and for the rest of us. I just watched a video on twitter where a man in Alaska LOST HIS MIND when he was not allowed to go without a mask into a Walmart. People are definitely insane, you guys. And this time period has brought a lot of that insanity to the surface.

The next crazy thing started with the tragic and horrible death of George Floyd, and the repercussions of that have certainly not died down. I'll go out on a limb here, and say what I believe: protesting is necessary, and sometimes it is necessary for protesters to defend themselves against the violence of cop crowd control. But there's no excuse for burning random buildings, hurting people, destroying history, and the like. Probably a lot of people (especially in my age bracket) won't support me on that, but it's what I believe.

Here's another thing that won't get much support, but it's also something I believe. I understand the phrase "Black Lives Matter," and what the movement is trying to do. And I know some people respond, not understanding that it may be construed as an insult, or blowing off the problem entirely, with the phrase "All Lives Matter." I understand that this is a phrase that has been used negatively in light of the BLM movement. However! When I personally say it, I do not mean it as a slight to the movement. I mean it from my heart. That all lives do matter, no matter what color, creed, sexuality, or anything else. So when I posted that on Facebook and got a lot of negative flack, I think that people who responded should know me a little bit better than that. Of course I didn't mean it against the movement! What kind of person do you think I am? A sympathetic one. So don't treat me badly for having a big heart. That's not fair or right. Just saying. This is a time that we all need to stand together. And everyone, it seems to me, is having great trouble doing that.

Sorry, rant over! I know it's unlike me to preach in these blogs, but I felt really strongly about those points, and wanted to bring them up. Especially with how relevant they are to right now.

But I digress. This blog is about the Quad Squad, so I had better update you on them! Firstly, my parents. Mom has decided to go to US Nationals this year with TAMAR Indian River, fondly known as Indy. I know she's going to be amazing with this amazing horse, and I can't wait to see the pair of them compete! Shout out to Troy Peterson for all the work he's done for us with this horse. We are so grateful to you and your barn, and to Tamara, who sold us this wonderful horse. We are very lucky to have him, and to count you and your barn among our friends!

Dad has been working from home since March. At first he mainly stayed cooped up in his office with conference calls, but now I see him several times a day, every day, just so we can say hey and chat. It's been wonderful having him home; I can't wait until he retires and belongs to us completely again :-)

I personally have been struggling with the quarantine from the virus. It was fine during the end of the previous school year, when we all went online, because my class still met via Zoom, and I was able to see familiar faces, and distract myself with schoolwork. That all changed during the summer, where I had some very low points, struggling with my depression and anxiety, and especially, loneliness. But I think I have come out of the woods now, and am in a good place. School starting definitely helped!

I am also talking to a really amazing guy. I won't mention his name because that's his business, but I am excited to see where this budding relationship goes. I like him a lot, and have high hopes for this! (Hopefully, I didn't embarrass him!)

I haven't seen much of my friends lately, but Elise is off to grad school for voice in Indiana! Go Elise! Also, Sarah had her second child, a beautiful boy named Carson, and Myrna also had a boy, her first, a strapping young lad named Austin! Rachel is working hard in school as a high school choir director, and her husband Chase is chipping away at getting his degree! I don't know if I have mentioned Colton, my high school friend, in these blogs before, but I am now: he's getting married to a wonderful girl named Christine; they are an amazing and beautiful couple and I'm excited for them! Another name I might not have mentioned is Grant. He is one of my best friends, whom I actually met on a dating website. He is also getting married to Kim, a wonderful woman who is a great match for him! I could not be more excited for, nor more proud of, my friends.

And then there's my crazy group of nurses. Peter is here five days a week, and we sound like an old married couple, playfully bickering constantly, giving each other crap, to see how well the other person will take it, and what ingenious thoughts they will have in response ;-) Not to mention our sarcastic debates! Peter is truly Peter the Great! But if that's the case, I also have Jim the Gentleman, the Amazing Amanda, the Awesome Aubrey, and the far more than Noble Ngozi. I have quite a group of people who take great care of me, physically and mentally, because they inevitably make me laugh every shift. They are all my family.

I started back on my fourth semester of school! After this one, with its two classes, I will be halfway through my Masters! I'm very excited for this semester, as I have some extremely interesting classes: Race and Identity in the Middle Ages, as well as a children's literature course, set in the Golden Age of children's lit: 1850 to 1940. Both of my professors are incredible, one of whom I've had several times before, but couldn't resist taking again, because she frequently opens my eyes and amazes me with new subjects, thoughts, and topics. I think my other professor is going to end up being the same way, from what I've seen so far. He is another very passionate teacher. Those kinds make the best ones!

Also, I have decided after grad school, I would like to try my hand at inspirational speaking. I plan to start with local high schools, and go from there. My messages will be to wear your seatbelt, of course, but also I hope to include messages that show the power of strength, determination, and perseverance. These are the things I can pass on to others, and I really, really want to. Hopefully my endeavor works :-)

That's about all for now :-) surprisingly I haven't got much else to say (I know, I know, it seems unbelievable!). I hope you all are staying safe, happy, and healthy during this difficult time. Remember to wear your masks, whether you like them or not! ;-) It's for the betterment of everyone, which means it's for the betterment of you individually, as well. I love all of you, and I appreciate so much all of the support I get from you guys! And so we go!

Am I the most inconsistent blogger, or what??

Prepare yourselves, y'all. This should be a long one!

Welcome back to the blog that I never add to! Or add to so infrequently as for it not to be a very good blog! To my old readers, thanks for sticking with me. To any new readers, I hope you enjoy a bit of humor in strange situations.

What can I tell you? A lot has been going on in my life this past… year … or so (gosh, I dread to look how long it's actually been since I last wrote!), so much so that I hardly know where to begin. Perhaps I should make a list:

School (a never-ending saga)
Social (or lack thereof) life
Family Matters
My new nursing crew
The animal madness
Health and all of the fun things that go with it

In keeping with the list, so I don't go off rambling on a tangent that no one cares to hear (this is hoping that you guys care to hear some of it! ;-)), let's begin with school. I am now in my third semester of graduate school for an English Literature degree that I will hopefully use! There's no telling on the surety of that, however! Even so, I'm plugging along, and I must say that I am thoroughly enjoying school; even the boring classes – by my standards at least, because I am aware that SO many people find English literature interesting –  have merit to me. I am only on my fifth class, having taken a partial load (two classes) for two semesters, and then only one this semester, but progress is progress, however slow.

I have taken a course called Literary Scholarship that everyone begins with, an American literature course in the Romantic era, a British Restoration course, a medieval literature course (Beowulf), and am currently taking a second medieval literature course (Chaucer) all of which have been great learning experiences, all of which have been challenging, all of which have been sometimes boring, and all of which have been quite enjoyable overall.

For those who don't know, I am going to Texas State, and I actually go to my classes in person, instead of having them online. This constitutes the majority of my social life (this is where you're supposed to laugh), and while I do speak in class, for those who knew me in undergrad or grade school, I actually have intelligent and pertinent things to say now. Apparently I am also occasionally funny, which, as my former fellow students can attest to, was not often the case. Obnoxious, certainly, but funny? Well, I was to me! But now even other people enjoy my nerdy literary jokes. I also talk a lot less in class that I did ever in undergrad and grade school (almost impossible to believe, I know, but hey, maybe I'm finally mellowing out in my old age), and I talk a lot less loudly. And that's not because of the ventilator, but rather because of my passion not to annoy my fellow students, a passion which I did not have in the past! (By the way, this entire paragraph is meant to be funny, so laugh, dammit! Funny, and also rather true…) ;-)

But while school constitutes the majority of my social life, I do occasionally do other things. Because I am nerdy and unashamed of it, I tell you that I have begun to play Dungeons & Dragons, and must say I have an awesome time every session. For those of you who know them, Jon Brehm, the DM (or Dungeon Master, which means that he creates the world in which the rest of our characters operate and function), and his wife Amy Peveto are part of the team. Jon adds puns and hilarity, while Amy brings her biting sarcasm to the table! My good friend Jacqueline, whom I have met since the beginning of school, as she is also my driver and notetaker for school, plays with us as well, adding her humor and quick wit to the group. We are a fun bunch, if a somewhat goofy bunch, and I for one always have a hell of a time!

Also in my social life are my best friends Rachel Rabon, Sarah Stevens, Myrna Peralez, and Elise Miller, all of whom come over as often as they can either in groups, pairs, or by themselves. Sarah often blesses us (truly, truly) with the presence of her beautiful and wicked smart two-year-old daughter, Harper, who has grown to love the two horses we have on our property. She sits on their backs, to her great delight, and when she has to get off it is to her great sadness (and by sadness I mean screaming and crying) ;-) I find her absolutely brilliant and adorable, and I'm always glad when Sarah visits with her.

I won't update you on their latest exploits, because that is their business, but everyone is happy and healthy, and I always love catching up and chatting with them when we are able to see one another! Love you girls!

I have also become friends, instead of just friendly, with one of my classmates, and I hope we remain friends as we slog through our Masters degrees!

In keeping with the list we made above, next I tell you about my family. As we seem to be in a holding pattern, there is not a ton to tell. Dad is working for DPS/homeland security, post-military retirement, and mom is looking to apply to begin teaching again! Now that we finally have stable nursing coverage, she can feel safer leaving the house regularly.

Speaking of nurses, I haven't introduced you to our new cast of characters in San Marcos. Ngozi, Our sweet and funny Nigerian nurse, is the only person who managed to stay with us through the move, though now she only works one day instead of three, considering she lives north of Austin. It's very kind of her to come all this way, but neither she nor we could imagine losing the other!

But we have three new nurses with us now: Peter, who works Monday through Friday day shifts (and these are long, grueling shifts in which I bother him incessantly, so I'm amazed he is still here!), Amanda, who works most of the night shifts, and Aubrey, who works a few of the night shifts. Each of them is very different, and all of them are very special to me. I've managed to make great connections with all three. Peter and I match wits every day, challenge each other with sarcasm, and generally have excellent discussions. He has a million great stories to tell, and a million more tangents to go on within the stories! He makes me laugh daily. And Amanda makes me laugh in the nighttime, with her antics, and her quirky sense of humor that really matches my own. She has become my book buddy: we read and discuss books that we recommend to each other, in the evenings as she gets me ready for bed. Aubrey is a bright spot (though so are the others), especially in that she is always positive, even in the face of great challenges in life. She is always so quick to laugh. I dearly love all four of my nurses, and desperately hope that they will stay as long as they can. I honestly can't imagine my life without them.

I can't imagine my life without my animals, either. They make me smile every day, whether it is simply watching the horses graze, the Aussies playing ball, the big dogs smiling at me, the birds talking to me, and more. The most recent thing we have happen is our miniature dachshund, Cori, managed to get into a tangle with a horse. Currently, her pelvis is broken, the base of her tail is broken, and she just had her femur reset surgically a few weeks ago. But you can't keep a good dog down! Literally. She's supposed to be convalescing, but gets so miserable being cooped up that mom just about carries her around with her wherever she goes. She toddles around a bit, all four feet working, and even has begun to wag her tail again. Looks like she'll be making a full recovery!

Speaking of broken femurs, though, that reminds me of the last topic on my list, which is my health. In all these five and half years, the only times I have been in the hospital unplanned was when the actual accident happened… Until last semester, where I had two stays in the hospital! The first one was due to a big scare that turned out to be a very small problem, and after some antibiotics, I was allowed to go home. After spending my birthday there (luckily Rachel and Peter visited me and raised my spirits considerably, as it is very easy to get depressed in the hospital)!

 The second stay was far more interesting. The story begins a few days earlier: as we do every day, my mom was stretching my legs, when we heard a sound as loud and clear as a gunshot. It's something I will never forget, and it makes my stomach drop every time I think of it. As I didn't seem to feel any pain, and we all agreed that if anything was broken I would most likely sense it at least, we decided that the sound couldn't have come from something internal, not when it was that sharp and clear. After giving me several checks over, we determined it was probably the colostomy bag having air forced out of it quickly while we stretched. Fast-forward two days (and we are stretching my legs vigorously, each day!), and then my knee gets a little bit swollen. The following morning, on a weekend (where we don't have nursing coverage), my entire thigh was swollen 2 inches in every direction.We feared a blood clot.

 So rather than jostle me and transfer me into my wheelchair, we had EMS take me in a more stable fashion to the emergency room. They did an ultrasound, and found no clots, and the ER doctor was writing off the swelling (without much of an explanation, mind you) and about to send me home, when the PA in the ICU decided I should get a CT scan of my leg, to see what turned up. While we waited for the results, they went ahead and admitted me. They finished admitting me at about 3 o'clock in the morning! But before that, the PA came in and said that my right leg looked fine from the CT scan. I said, "But it's my left leg that has the problem…" He looked uncertain for a moment, checked his charts, and then said that the people who had taken the CT had rendered pictures of the wrong leg. Thankfully I didn't have to take another CT, in that it would have meant laboriously transferring from my uncomfortable hospital bed onto a gurney, then I would have been rolled to the elevators down and two floors to the CT room, where I would again be uncomfortably transferred onto the table for the scan, and then the whole process reversed to return me to my room (not that I'm complaining, or anything :/ ). Instead they went back to their original images, and clarified the pictures of my other leg.

This was slightly heartening (at about midnight), and then the PA came in and said yes, there was indeed fluid in my knee…. thanks, but of course there was! We all knew that! That and the swelling  of my thigh was what caused us to come in the first place. Come on, people! So I was a bit upset, thinking that if there was just some swelling, what was I doing here, laying in this horrible bed with mom curled up on the recliner beside me? The PA said they would hand the case to ortho in the morning.

Damn good thing they did! One of the ortho doctors walked in in the morning and said without pause, "Well, I don't know how they missed it, but your femur is completely broken." Whoa! Come again? We realized suddenly that the sharp crack, that gunshot-like sound we had heard several days ago had been the sound of my femur snapping! And then we had stretched me with my broken leg for two days!… … Needless to say, mom felt guilty (it probably didn't help that we called her Bone Crusher…), though there was absolutely no way she could've known that was going to happen, as every doctor recommended that I do stretches. In the end, they realized a cast would be almost impossible for me: with my leg sticking out in front of me, I wouldn't have even been able to fit into my van to go home, let alone to class for the eight weeks they said it would take to heal. So instead they fixed it surgically, incredibly, putting a rod down the length of my femur and several screws in my hip and the base of my femur at my knee. There were only three tiny incisions! It was really quite amazing, and quite an ordeal. I still can't believe I felt absolutely NOTHING… Not a thing! But we are past the eight weeks now, and I am all cleared and ready for takeoff… More or less. It's not as though I'll be walking on the leg. ;-) (Quad jokes, people. Don't forget to laugh!)

So that is my very long update about what's been going on in Casa de Nichols of late. Now we are hunkering down in the wake of this stupid virus, but no one in my family has attacked other people over toilet paper… yet! In these troubled times, in what is considered a health crisis that goes far beyond the nation, please try to come together, instead of apart. I'm not saying physically congregate in groups over 50! But even with phone calls and texts and emails, support one another. Remain positive, be safe, but above all, be kind. Everybody can use a little more kindness in their lives, either in giving or receiving it.

But that's all for me for now. I hope you will stay safe and happy as much as you can at this time. Alexa, signing off! And so we go!