I thought I was so clever when I came up with that snappy saying! I was day-dreaming, trying to orient my disoriented quarantined-after-two-weeks self. I remembered the famous novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. How I read “Love in the Time of Cholera” when I was about 19 or 20, when it was hot, deep into a Michigan summer. I was a Camp Counselor and I remember the colorful cover of the book against the wood of my bunk.

I remember thinking, how can this be? That a person could and would love another for a lifetime, yet be apart – just waiting patiently. But that’s what the story is about.

And that’s what the pandemic makes us do. Wait. Love can be as powerful as disease. But love is no disease. It’s usually what gets us up in the morning – love for others, love for work, love for our lives.

We’ll be writing about this for years – what love shall be like now, in its many different forms. People say, I see a bad moon rising. I see trouble on the way. Our instincts may be telling us that everyone will be and probably should be more cautious, when it comes to nurturing friendships and other important relationships, in partnerships and in our communities.

Frankly I can’t quite wrap my head around it all yet. And love can be so tricky . . . it can make us deny the writing on the wall. I am still in denial. “No, it can’t be . . . ” Who wants to mourn what will never happen? That sounds horrible.

Call me a dreamer, but I’d rather love now, and look forward to even more love later. Love is no one-trick pony. Love can work in so many different ways, on infinite planes. We must let go of fear – just let go of all kinds of negativity that gets in the way. Yet the public drum beat is “BE AFRAID! Be so afraid you don’t leave your house. Or be with others . . . “

We are six weeks in, lovely people. We made it. And we’ll do it again, and again . . . patiently, patiently.

See you Sunday!

Rev. Hannah