A coworker posted on Facebook a couple days ago about how they saw it a year ago, when things started getting serious regards the virus. It brought back a slew of my own memories, which I should probably set down here while they’re still somewhat fresh.

I’d come back home from California, and the protocol at work already was if you were out of state you had to self quarantine for two weeks. So I was already in work at home mode when the news came down that they were scheduling a mass work at home day for everyone at the Institute except critical staff, to basically run a test to see how well we could manage if it came down to it when someone inside the building tested positive.

I already figured we’d do okay. For well over a decade we were allowed to designate one day a week as our telecommute day and we were already up to speed with supporting offsite work. So for me it was just a routine self quarantine day. But it was a good thing we’d been doing it for years by then, because a few days later the Institute became off limits to everyone but the workers disinfecting everything, because someone who was in the building later Did test positive.

It’s a few days more than a year later, and I’ve basically not spent a regular week at the office since I left for my California visit over a year ago. As time went on management developed various protocols for staff entering and working in the building when it was absolutely necessary…usually for supporting JWST testing in the MOC, which simply cannot be done remotely. So I’ve been back inside on a case by case basis. But it’s not just that masking up is mandatory now. You have to request entry days ahead of time, the request has to be approved by the health and security folks, you get a temperature check before you’re allowed inside, and now we have to each wear these proximity detector things to enforce keeping a safe distance, and to aid in contact tracing just in case.

I feel so very lucky to be working for an employer who seriously takes the safety of the staff seriously. Also that I have a job that I Can still work from home and draw a paycheck. 

A friend posted on his Facebook page the other day about how a year ago he sat down for his last meal inside a restaurant, though he did not know it at the time. He was on the way home from a road trip and stopped for lunch. By then panic buying of basic supplies was already in the wind.

What I remember is a last dinner and drinks at Old Juan’s Cantina in Oceano, which is a favorite spot when I’m out there, the day before I left for home. That would have been a year ago plus a week perhaps. While on the road the stories I heard on the radio frightened me enough that whenever I stopped for the night, instead of dining in somewhere I always got carryout and took it back to my hotel room.

Panic buying of cleaning supplies and disinfectant wipes had already set in at Oceano before I left. I figured I was safe enough alone in my car, but every time I stopped for anything I washed my hands furiously. I had a small stack of disinfectant wipes I’d brought along to California that was part of my travel kit, intended mostly to prevent catching a flu, like I had during one Disney World visit that nearly ruined the entire vacation. I rationed them very carefully on the trip home, using the wipes only to wipe down my hotel room right after checking in. I had one left when I got back home.

I’ve not seen any on any store shelf since. Another friend tells me that they’re only just now starting to reappear on some random grocery store shelves.