Featured Refresh
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How is the coronavirus pandemic affecting your life right now? Tell us about your experiences, feelings, and thoughts.
I get seasonal allergies every spring: juniper and elm. Sneezing, coughing, itchiness -- it's awful. Last spring I got the usual symptoms, but mixed in was this fear that perhaps it was not just a cold, not just hay fever, but ... [scary music] ... the Coronavirus! Aaaaah! Of all the symptoms that indicated you'd caught Covid-19, the one I fixated on was the loss of smell and taste. I put a container of strongly scented vanilla hand lotion next to my bed. If I woke up and felt particularly anxious that perhaps I had been exposed to Covid-19, I would open the container and take a cautious sniff. I have a small collection of perfume, too, but since I was working from home, I didn't always put any on. The levels in the bottles stayed the same for months.
April 6, 2023
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How is the coronavirus pandemic affecting your life right now? Tell us about your experiences, feelings, and thoughts.
This is a bewildering time in the pandemic with conflicting, shifting messages from health authorities and governmental agencies. According to the state Department of Health, New Mexico is 65% fully vaccinated and had been re-opening steadily. Movie theaters, restaurants, bars, offices -- it was wonderful to feel like we were on the upswing. But with the increase in the infectiousness of the Delta variant of the virus, we're reinstating measures. Starting Monday everyone is instructed to wear masks again at my workplace, the University of New Mexico. These signs at the Frontier Restaurant on Central Avenue right across from the University illustrate the erratic feeling of this period. One says, hopefully, "Customers who are Fully Vaccinated may enter without a face mask." The other, larger sign says, "For Dine-In or Take-Out Orders Placed Inside We are REQUIRED to ask you for CONTACT TRACING INFORMATION". It's like they are from two different periods of the pandemic. It's challenging to sort out what rules and norms apply at the moment.
August 1, 2021