COVID-19 - Pandemic - News - Era of No Sports - 2021 Return
I feel like a decade has passed since I’ve last posted here. We’ve all lived entire years within only a month. The world is a very different place than it was weeks ago when we last spoke.
Where I’m at in the US, we’ve been under lockdown for over a month now. My wife and I haven’t seen or talked to anyone during that time. We have a large lot of property, so we can leave the house to get fresh air. But no contact with anyone else.
Since there isn't really anything sports related for me to write about right now, I'll instead talk about what life has been like sans sports.
Caught in Transition
Much like everyone else, I was not prepared for a pandemic, but unlike everyone else, I was caught in the middle of a two-week trip in March when the events began to transpire.
During the early part of March, I traveled back to my home state of Indiana. My mother was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, and I went back home to see her before her surgery.
While I was back at home, on the other side of the globe China was beginning to lockdown Wuhan and other surrounding cities. At that time our government was telling us there’s nothing to worry about, but I sensed that wasn’t true.
I got back home to North Carolina just as the virus was beginning to hit the coastal cities in the United States, and then everything began to unwind. Schools were cancelled. Sporting events next. Then the wave of restaurant closing followed shortly after. By that time, everyone here was panic buying and starting to get nervous.
A Very Close Call
Finally, I was back home with my wife and a cupboard full of food. Feeling safe for the time being, I thought we had lucked out. But back in Indiana, the place I just left, a problem was developing.
My 76-year-old diabetic grandma was begging to have health issues, and although it wasn’t COVID related, it would end up putting her right in the middle of a virus outbreak in Indianapolis.
My grandmother had an infection deep in her organs that developed and spread across her whole body. While Indiana was put in lockdown, as an outbreak moved through Indianapolis, the local hospital could no longer treat her, and she required being moved to the ICU in Indianapolis, the very center of Indiana’s outbreak.
Once in the ICU, she was quickly put on a ventilator, and because of the virus, no family members were able to see her. There she sat alone in the ICU hooked to a ventilator surrounded by COVID patients. My absolute worst nightmare.
While my family waited anxiously, my grandma, while in a induced coma, began to fight off the infection. She was hooked to a ventilator, a feeding tube, and dialysis, a terrible combination with low survivability, and yet—despite all odds—she continued to get better and better with each passing day.
That has now been over a week ago, and I am extremely happy to say that she is no longer on any machines and is no longer in the ICU. They have now moved her out of the hospital and into a rehab center where she continues to recover today.
A New Way of Living
It’s safe to say that no part of our lives has been left unaffected by the COVID-19 virus. My wife is a college professor, so we saw firsthand the quick changes the schools underwent. As for food, all the restaurants are closed besides drive-thru. We do all of grocery shopping online now, getting our food delivered or by curbside pickup.
In my region, we’ve been recording COVID deaths for weeks now. As shopping ramped up for the Easter Holiday, it was reported that grocery store clerks and fast food workers in my county had tested positive, infecting who knows how many people before they were tested.
Life has been especially lonely for my wife and I. We both live around 800 miles away from our closest family members, meaning we haven’t seen any of them in person for quite some time now. Of course, this is great in regards to stopping the spread but terrible in regards to mental health.
No Sports. No Fun.
I would love to say that I have used this new “free” time, in this world without sports, to be more productive, but alas, I have not. I’ve been mostly stricken with anxiety and fear for the health of my grandma. Fighting off bouts of depression has largely taken the place of watching and discussing sports.
It’s not just a life without sports, but it’s a life without talking about sports with my friends, without watching sport with friends and family. It’s a life without having news about sports to read, or sporting events to write about. There’s no sports to bet on, no breaking news to respond to. Nothing. It’s a life devoid of my greatest passion: sports.
Maybe we’ll see the world begin to slowly open again. There seems to be positive signs coming from places like Italy, Spain and New York City, but even if restrictions are eased, sports will be one of the very last things to return to normalcy.
The very idea of a sporting even is to pack as many people as possible into a small stadium. Then have those fans, drink beer, yell and jump around for hours at a time. It will be a long time before we ever see those sights again. Over the past 24 hours, Western Media outlets have began reporting that it is unlikely we will see fans at sporting events until Fall 2021.
I do not have any doubt that, as soon as it is humanly possible, sports leagues will begin playing again in empty stadiums. Some sports leagues have even said they are exploring ideas to use special effects to make the stadiums appear to have people in them. None of this interests me.
For me, sports without fans isn’t sports. I doubt I will watch much if any sports so long as it’s being done in empty stadiums. It just doesn’t feel right nor do I find it entertaining. It’s like going shopping without any money. There’s no fun to be had.
Facing the Strange
For now, we must all adjust to the changes in our lives. Maybe it will be over soon. Maybe the anxiousness to get countries reopened will lead to another wave of infections. Maybe in a month we’ll have the virus completely beat. Whoever says they know what will happen next is lying. The future is unknown.
For me, all I can do is take care of my family and myself. I’m not waiting around to see if this pandemic has taught anyone else a lesson or if it will lead to positive changes within our societies. It’s certainly taught me many lessons already and continues to do so.
Right now, I’m trying to fill some of my extra time by working on a garden. I grew up tending a large garden with my family. Now that I’m an adult myself, it’s time I take up this tradition. Nothing tastes better than the food your grow yourself.
Nothing makes you feel safer than being self-sustaining.
This post was shared on LinkedIn & Twitter in conjunction with @promo.scr.
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