The annual migrations - COVID edition

After a few weeks in California we decided to go on our annual migration.  We hadn't planned on coming to the US this summer let alone visiting family in Utah and Idaho.  Even though there were various restrictions and recommendations, we went anyway.  We drove straight through the 12+ hours from California to Utah.  We usually stay over with friends in Reno.  But things being the way they were we kept to ourselves.  There wasn't any of the usual traffic, but it was still a long day.  In Utah you were supposed to register when you entered the state.  Only a few people did.  We didn't.  At that time there were still only a few cases in Utah outside of Salt Lake City and Park City.  Northern California had more, but still relatively few cases compared to other parts of the country, and was quite shut down compared to Utah.  New York was the national hot spot.

We had a great trip.  It was completely relaxing since we didn't chase around and do big things.  We visited my parents and brothers and just didn't do anything special.  It was great.  So often when we get together it is an Event.  This time I had time to talk to everyone and just spend time together.  We celebrated Cinco de Mayo and Star Wars Day.  We went on walks and bike rides, played games, and watched the Mandalorian.  

LDS Salt Lake Temple under construction

The flowers on Temple Square are always beautiful, but especially in the spring.

I love the combination of shirts here for Star Wars day (May the 4th be with you).  They really are good friends.  She calls him her emotional support human.

The candy had a rough time in the pinata.

Just dance!

Scout camps in Switzerland and California were cancelled this summer like so many other events and activities.  There were only 10 BSA camps open this summer and for many of those the seasons were short.  My Sister-in-law and niece are in a BSA troop in Utah so they invited us to go to Camp Loll with them.  This was the second migration for the summer, not something we usually do.  We were excited to go, but Nevada didn't get any smaller in the weeks between our visits.  We spend a lot of time in the car on these migrations.  We pass the time listening to podcasts (me) or watching videos and playing games (kids).  We listen to music and sometimes sing along.  We listened to all sorts of things including Hamilton, Abba Gold, Blues Brothers, and a funny CD called Gear Jammin' Greats.  It's perfect for road trips.  It's a compilation album of trucking songs from the 70s including classics like Six Days on the Road, Convoy, and I'm a Truck.  John bought it the summer he was driving tomato trucks in central California 25 years ago.  It makes me smile.

Before heading up to camp we had an impromptu family reunion.  On Friday we went ice blocking at a park then played 9 square and camped in my brother's yard.  Early the next day we headed up the canyon to Pineview reservoir for a day on the water.  Such a fun weekend.  

For those unfamiliar with the fabulous sport of ice blocking it is pretty self explanatory.  You sit on a block of ice and slide down a grassy hill on a hot summer day.  Bonus if you have a towel to put on top of the ice block.  You still get a wet behind, but you are less likely to stick to the ice.  I remember the ice blocks being bigger.  Maybe they shrank, maybe I grew.

9 square in action

Pineview sand? castle

After the 12+ hours to Utah we still had another 5 hours to get to camp.  Fortunately we were able to say with my brother in Idaho, only 2 hours from camp.  Camp Loll is just over the Idaho border into Wyoming a couple miles south of Yellowstone National Park and north of the iconic sawtooth peaks of the Teton mountains.  It is a beautiful drive.  You go from the flat farm valley surrounding Rexburg then off the highway through Squirrel, Idaho.  Squirrel is a beautiful place.  Widely scattered farm houses surrounded by fields of potatoes and barley.  You know you are in Squirrel because there is a lonely little cemetery with a sign that says Squirrel Cemetery.  The paved road ends soon after Squirrel as you ride up through the mountain meadows, quaking aspen and sunflowers.  You are getting close to camp after you move up to pine trees, bear grass, and lupine.  It is a stunningly beautiful location, quite isolated from any towns or city lights.  At night I heard sounds I didn't recognize.  I thought at first it might be a distant train whistle, but there aren't any trains nearby.  We found out that it was bugling elk that were keeping me awake, thanks to the NPS Yellowstone sound library.  Add that to the birds that start singing at first light and the scouts that are woken up by the birds and you get some early mornings.

View of the lake from our camp site.

Side view of the big rappelling rock.

One day I went with the older scouts to the 90 foot rappelling rock.  The view over the valley was spectacular.  The camp lake looked so small and far away.  You could look across the valley and out on the horizon you could just see the tip of the center tooth of the Teton range.  It's been awhile since I did any climbing or rappelling, but it was still a lot of fun.

On a different day and different 25 foot rock My Girl tried rappelling for the first time.  She was nervous about it, but overcame the fear and did a great job.  She even went down a second time.  I am so glad she gave it a try.

The camp director has been there for ages.  He had two sons there on staff with their little kids running around.  The staff were experienced and excellent.  The director had pulled in all his favors from years of work to get the volunteers needed to run the camp this summer.  No one was sure if the camp would happen or not.  It was all up to the county health department.  With many assurances of mask wearing, hand sanitizing, and social distancing the camp was allowed to happen.  It was one of only 10 BSA camps open this year.  The program was quite traditional with all the merit badge classes one would expect including the water front badges offered in a freezing cold lake.  The camp fires and flag ceremonies were full of patriotism and reverence with a healthy dose of silliness.  The songs and skits were fun and funny.  Our troop isn't one for much singing.  Except for a well done and very memorable operatic rendition of the Phineas and Ferb theme song at camp last year.  

On one night they had Scottish highland games.  It was quite impressive to see what games they came up with that were fun and scouty and designed to keep the scouts at a distance the health department would approve of.  Most impressive was the fact that the staff included not one, but two bagpipe players and a young woman playing Scottish fiddle tunes while the scouts played their games.  What does that job listing look like?  

Wanted: Experienced volunteer camp staff.  Must be happy to live without cell service, wifi, indoor showers, or flushing toilets.  Must be able to sing, perform skits, teach classes, calm anxious tweens about to go over the edges of tall cliffs and be willing to face down bears and multitudes of very large mosquitos.  Bagpipe players and fiddlers preferred.  

In reality several of the adult staff are high school teachers who invite the best of the best in their schools to come work at camp.  Only a few are hired through the regular application process.  This summer with schools and jobs on hold the staff were people who had been coming to camp for years.  One of the staff members was up at camp volunteering since him mom was working in the cantina.   It turns out that my brother and I were neighbors with his dad when we were growing up.  It was fun to tell him stories about his dad and grandpa.  Our commissioner was a youngish college professor who was teaching online for the summer.  He had been on staff as a teen.  It had been a positive life changing experience for him.  He and his family still camp with his friends made on staff many years ago.

One of the camp traditions is the Polar Bear challenge.  This is a common enough thing at scout camps.  Typically it involves an early morning dip at the waterfront.  This one is a little different.  This Polar Bear is a 10 second shower in a little waterfall fed by snow melt.  They can't let you stay longer than 10 seconds because of risk of hypothermia.  And yes, this is the stream that feeds the camp's icy lake.  All that for the ice blue bead.  My Girl and I did the swim check in the lake on the first day but didn't get in the water after that.

Wednesday was hike day.  We chose the hike to Terraced Falls.  Depending on who you ask it was 8 or 10 miles.  Part of the troop went to Union Falls, a 20 mile round trip.  I've done 20 miles in a day before and this just wasn't the day to repeat that.  My boy wanted to stay in camp for the day.  At another time I might have insisted, but I let him stay this time.  It turned out fine.  He stayed in camp and got to try blacksmithing.

Bear grass blooming

We hiked along the camp lake to the official trailhead and crossed into Yellowstone.  No gate.  No line of cars.  Perfect.  After entering the park, much of the trail runs along the Falls River.  

We saw several falls and rapids before we came to the big one at the end of our hike.  The whole thing was gorgeous.  It was a beautiful hike and just right for me that day.

During down time in camp a couple of the leaders taught the scouts things like wood carving and stone knapping.  I made a wooden spoon and my girl made an obsidian arrow head.

It was such a great week well worth the effort to get there.  

After camp we spent a couple of days with Grandma and Grandpa doing laundry, catching up, and resting.  Then it was time to go home.  We went home the long way through Southern Utah instead of our usual route through Reno.  We arrived in time for a late afternoon swim and a sunset walk through a desert botanical park.  It all reminded me how much I love the red rocks of Southern Utah.  Another time we'll stay longer and see more.  There is always more to see and do.

P.S.  After we got home the odometer on our trusty minivan read over 223,000 miles.  That's a lot of migration miles.

Fresh air

The week after school ended Grammie treated us to some beach time.  We went to Pajaro Dunes, a place where she has a lot of fond memories of time with family over the years.  John remembers spending Thanksgiving there with cousins and having a great time.  It was a magical week that provided the reset we all needed.

We really enjoyed the change of scenery, the lovely weather, and of course walking the beach.  We found shells, kelp, jellyfish, and sand crabs.  We ate sandwiches and sausages from Freedom meat lockers.  At night we saw owls and the fishing boats out in the bay.  The kids even braved the cold water for a bit of swimming on the days we saw the sun.  There were a few people around, but plenty of open space.  Dad, GrandDad, and Aunt B came for lovely relaxing visits.

I love this 3D wooden map of the area. (source)

We filled the spare time with reading and puzzling.  The puzzle for the week was a nearly impossible floral without a single straight edge.  It was tricky, but we got it done.

Days not at the museum

Many museums are closed for awhile.  Except for the Emergency Art Museum that popped up in a nearby neighborhood.  What a fun idea.  It makes me smile when I see it. (in the news) 

We're getting close to the end of the school year.  It's been a tough slog for everyone.  Some kids have done better than others.  My Girl decided to get up at for her last class of the day.  Here in California it is at 5:00 am.  It is pretty difficult to do online learning when you don't get to interact with the teachers in person and some are less responsive than you would like.  A couple of teachers have recorded their classes which helps.  For other classes she is more on her own.  She really had done an amazing job.  In spite of all of that she earned awards for math, science, and writing at the end of year awards ceremony.  She didn't attend.  It was at 1:00 am.

My Boy attends the second session offered by three of his teachers.  These teachers repeat the class at 6 pm for students in the Western hemisphere.  It has helped immensely.  There was some frustration when I found out he was behind in a couple of classes.  There was a serious breakdown in communication about assignments and work to be done.  I can understand teachers wanting to deal directly with students, but sometimes it is good to let the parents in on it too.  He rallied somewhat reluctantly and got the essential work done.  So glad it is over for now.

On the second week of online school while we were still in Rome My Girl's writing teacher sent the kids on a virtual field trip to an online museum to find a picture that showed how they were feeling and write about it.  This is what My Girl found.  It is Interrupted Reading from the Art Institute of Chicago.  We were only a couple weeks into this whole thing and it was already starting to wear her down.

There are a lot of museums online but it can't replace the experience of actually being there.

Another fun writing assignment was "Paint-chip Poetry".  The teacher posted several paint-chips with different color names.  The students then wrote a poem or very short story using all of the color names in order.  They were allowed to add word endings, but couldn't change the words themselves or word order.  It was fun to see what she came up with.

In English her class is reading Fever 1793, a book about the Yellow Fever epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793.  The book is part of the usual curriculum, but what a time to be reading it!  Although the kids in Rome are unlikely to know someone who has died from the current pandemic, it has been a big disruption for them.  There is a lot of worry in the air.  The teacher went above and beyond by arranging an author "visit" to the virtual classroom.  It was a highlight of the class.  I'm not sure how she arranged it, but the kids loved it.

She has really enjoyed reading historical fiction this spring.  A couple of favorites were The War That Saved My Life and its sequel, The Witch Of Blackbird Pond, and Johnny Tremain.  Her teacher also recommended Jefferson's Sons.  A sort of fantasy time travel historical fiction was Once Was a Time.  We still have our library card and the e-books have been a life saver.

We visited the beach in between constantly changing orders for opening and closing.  It seems to have settled now that the beaches are closed 11-5, but you can cross the beach if you are surfing or swimming.

The days pass are fill with something, but it is hard to say what.  I should be accomplishing great things with all of this time on hand.  I am spending time working on a new class and doing the daily do list of things.

A day at the museum

It seems like it was years ago that we visited the Vatican.  In reality it was Saturday, March 7.  There were recommendations to stay away from crowds, but museums and restaurants were still open.  Schools had been closed for a couple of days, but life wasn't so bad.  Schools were only closed "until March 15th".  Two days later the whole country and most businesses were shut down.  Now they are saying that schools may open in the fall for online instruction only.  I hope that changes.  Yesterday (April 21), they announced that a few factories and other businesses would be allowed to open in May.  Last week stores that sell children's clothing and bookstores were allowed to open as long as everyone wears masks and gloves and keeps their distance.  It will be awhile before a museum day like this will happen again.

The day before going to the Vatican we avoided the crowds by taking a walk near the Colosseum.  It was deserted, except for a few stragglers and a tour group or two wearing masks.  Saturday we went to the museum to avoid the crowds.  There were people there, but it wasn't crowded.  We were able to walk up to the ticket office without a line.  Normally there would be a line hours and hours long.  It was actually perfect for my crowd-hating family.

There is so much to see it is impossible to describe even a fraction of it.  I loved the mosaic floors.  Room after room had amazing works of art in the tile floor.  The best pieces are fenced off to avoid wear and tear, but for many years this is what was underfoot.  Incredible.

Probably the most famous ceiling in the world is the Sistine chapel.  It is pretty amazing and I did sneak a picture just before the security guard told me not to.  You have to see it, just because it is what it is and it was painted by Michelangelo.  What many do not realize is that the walls were painted by other artists in the late 15th century.  At that point the ceiling was painted as a starry sky.  Michelangelo was commissioned to repaint the ceiling and upper portions of the walls in 1508.  The central panels tell the stories from the book of Genesis.  It took 4 years to finish the work.

 

I forced the kids to stay with me until we had seen the Sistine Chapel.  They were ready to go home by that point.  It had been a couple of hours, but you can't go to the Vatican and not see the Sistine Chapel.  After that I cut them loose to go home and worked by way back through the museum so that I could spend more time with my favorites and take my time with the rest.

I almost hate to say it, but the Sistine Chapel isn't my favorite ceiling in Rome and definitely not my favorite room.  This is an example of the ceiling in a random Vatican hallway.  Just as amazing to me, probably done much later, but not something anyone would have heard of.

I prefer the ceiling at St Ignatius.  The frescoes here are from a completely different time period, the Baroque era of the late 17th-early 18th century.  They have a big mirror on the floor so you don't hurt your neck looking up at the center part of the building.  How kind.  St Ignatius also has a fake dome painted on the ceiling.  I think that is pretty funny.  If you stand in the center of the building it looks quite convincing.  If you are off to the side it still looks, good, but the perspective is off just enough that you can tell something is wrong.

 The fake dome painted on the the ceiling of St Ignatius di Loyola

Photo of the ceiling of St Ignatius in the mirror taken at the end of October, 2019

But really, my favorite type of church ceilings are the old Byzantine style mosaics.  This example is from the Chapel of Venatius in the Lateran Baptistery behind the Basilica San Giovanni in Laterno near our house.  The original baptistery dates from the time of Constantine in the 4th century.  The octagonal building there today is 5th century.  This chapel and the mosaics were added later in the 7th century.  Unfortunately, even later a tall alter was placed in front of the mosaics in the apse so you have to peek behind to get a good look.

So many ceilings, so little time...

Back to the Vatican...

I think that this could be one of my favorite rooms in Rome.  It's probably my favorite room in the Vatican.  It's one of the four rooms called Raphael's Rooms today.  It was painted by Raphael and his crew at the same time Michelangelo was working on the Sistine Chapel down the hall.  It was originally a private Papal apartment.  Can you imagine this as your private study?  This particular room is called the Room of the Segnatura and houses one of Raphael's most famous works, the School of Athens.  This wall features all of the Greats from ancient Greece and represents rational truth and philosophy.

I love that Raphael included a little self portrait off to the side.  He is the young man in the black cap looking out at you.  It reminds me of the image used in the posters for the big Raphael exhibit that opened that weekend.  It was only open for 2 days before the museums were closed in the national shut down.  It looks unlikely that the museums will open any time soon.  The exhibit celebrates the 500th anniversary of Raphael's death.  The big question now is if the pieces on loan will be allowed to stay so that people can see them together after the museums reopen.

On the opposite wall is the Disputation of the Holy Sacraments, or Triumph of the Church, which represents theology.  It includes Christ on his throne, God the Father, the Holy Ghost, as well as many prophets, saints and martyrs.  Figures above represent the triumphant church in the glory of God.  The figures below are those who fought against evil on earth, the militant church.  Interestingly, this included Dante Alighieri.  He is behind the pope in gold robes and is wearing a laurel wreath.

Some of my favorite objects in the museum were these models by Bernini and friends.  He didn't work alone.  They were working pieces made in preparation for later bronze castings.  All of the angels have broken noses.  They are far from perfect condition and I think that is what I like so much about them.  I love that you can see the straw and metal armatures through the broken clay.  They are broken and still quite beautiful.

Toward the end of the museum there is a hall called the Christian museum.  In this hall there are cases of vitri dorati, or gilded glass.  These objects first collected in the 17th and 18th centuries, but made for the early Christians of the 3rd and 4th centuries.  The objects are small glass discs with a thin layer of gold sandwiched between layers.  The images in the gold depict stories from the Bible or wealthy couples and families.  Some of these objects were the bottoms of glasses or bowls.  Others were decorations for glass objects or seals for burial niches in the catacombs.

The miracle at Cana

The Original Sin - Eve, Serpent in a tree, Adam

A bridal couple

I was enchanted by these little gems.  The smaller ones depicting the bible stories are maybe an inch across.  The larger one of the couple is maybe 2.5 inches.

The path through the exhibits twists and turns so many times it is impossible to keep track of where you are.  Somewhere between Raphael's rooms and the Sistine Chapel the walkways detour through a newer addition where more contemporary art is displayed, including a very large work on paper by Matisse and a small painting by Van Gogh.  Other works by Matisse included mock ups for stained glass windows in France.

It was a great day.  I loved visiting the museums.  I hope to go back sometime sooner than later.  

On the way home I stopped by Castroni and bought oyster sauce and a few other hard to find items.  I was quite happy to find it because I wanted to make stir fry.  Sometimes you need a break from the Italian food.

...into the fire

We left Rome early in the morning of March 25.  We had to take two taxis to the airport since the newest restrictions at the time limited the number of passengers per taxi.  I worried about everything going smoothly that day.  There were a lot of things that could have gone wrong, but it ended up an uneventful trip, thankfully.  At the airport there was a large group of seminarians, student priests, returning to the US on our flight.  The Catholic seminaries had closed and they were returning home or to new assignments.  The lines were a bit long, but I've seen worse.  Overall it was less crowded because so few people are flying.  It was a little eerie with all of the shops closed.  Alitalia required all passengers to wear masks or face coverings.  The ones they provided were little strips of fabric with holes for your ears.  They would barely qualify as a face covering and wouldn't do any good as a mask.  The flight was maybe half full with plenty of space in between people.

We flew from Rome to JFK in New York, a virus hot spot, which was a bit of a worry.  Our only other option was to fly through London.  I didn't want to do that because I wanted a direct flight to the US.  I didn't want to run the risk of any border quarantine issues in another country.  So much is so unpredictable.  I felt like everything was changing so rapidly.  As we arrived we all had to fill out a form declaring where we had been in the past 14 days.  As we left the plane we each had our temperature checked on the Jetway before they let us into the airport.  JFK was also strangely quiet.  There were only a few people working there and a few more passengers.  It took awhile to get through security and screening, but we made it just fine.  Our next flight was directly to SFO.  The flight was pretty empty so we each had our own row to stretch out and get some sleep.  After a bit of a rest it was so nice to get back home.

That day I celebrated Dantedi, This is a relatively new Italian holiday to celebrate Dante Alighieri, the Italian poet know by some as the father of the Italian language.  Next year is the 700th anniversary of his death.  Big celebrations are planned.  He is best known for writing the Divine Comedy.  It isn't funny.  It is called a comedy because at the time, writing was divided into tragedies and comedies.  Tragedies were written in Latin.  Writings in Italian, the common language, were considered comedies even if they chronicle a trip through horrific layers of hell.  What better way to celebrate Dante than a 19 hour flight fleeing a center of a global pandemic.  It seemed fitting somehow.  The celebration continued when I grabbed a copy of Dan Brown's Inferno I had picked up at a used bookstore weeks ago, to read on the planes.  It was oddly appropriate, or inappropriate depending on your view, since the plot centers around a madman's plot to infect the world with a bioengineered virus.  I don't think I can recommend the book overall.  It is typical Dan Brown with conspiracies centered around great works of art and architecture, but it all fell a little flat and seemed formulaic.  My Boy really likes Dante's Inferno.  He read an English translation a couple years ago.  He was introduce to the story by a series of YouTube videos on a channel he really likes. 

Even though we are home in California we aren't back in our house.  We rented it out while we were planning to be gone.  We stayed in an Airbnb for our days of self-isolation before moving in with my in-laws.   John has been there since January while he has been working on tax season.  The tax deadline has been extended by three months and the people who get their paperwork in at the last minute now have an extra three months to procrastinate so his work has slowed for awhile.  We were able to stop by the house and pick up bicycles we had stored in the backyard shed.

The kids are continuing with their online schooling from Rome.  It is more difficult now with the 9 hour time difference.  Some of My Boy's teachers are having two online class sessions at different times to accommodate the students who are temporarily in the Western hemisphere.  Other classes are recorded or he communicates the best he can with email and in class messages.  These online classes aren't the best environment for him.  It is a struggle.  My Girl decided she wanted to attend her last class of the day.  That means getting up for a 5 am online video class.  It works for her.  These classes have group projects and things that would be difficult to do outside of class.  She got put into a new project group with a couple of boys she considers complete slackers because one of the boys is in Mexico and the time zones are more similar.  She hates it because neither of the boys show up for their planned group work sessions.  One of her morning teachers records his lectures, which is helpful.  The online learning stresses her out completely because it takes more effort to keep on top of things and know if you are getting 100% or not.

It is a little strange to be back.  There are things I appreciate that I never thought of before, clothes dryers, garbage disposals, driving, Target, and restaurants open for take out.  Some of the changes I find strange.  The shortage of toilet paper baffles me.  All of a sudden Americans have turned into bakers emptying the shelves of flour, yeast, and eggs.  The "social distance" in Italy is 1 meter.  In the US it is 6 feet.  Why?  No one knows.  Stores are implementing their own social distance policies differently, leading to strange new protocols for grocery shopping.

My landlady and other Italian friends thought we were crazy for leaving Italy to come to the US, especially California.  From the headlines it didn't look good.  American political leaders were making strange statements.  Italians considered the American attitude cavalier.

The restrictions in Rome are getting more and more strict.  The rules are becoming more restrictive and the enforcement is tightening.  I'm glad to be back in California.  There are social distancing restrictions, but it just isn't the same.

I wondered if I was jumping from the frying pan and into the fire.  The number of cases in California was growing, it looked like it could become one of the global hot spots.   The day before we left Rome had 1,287 cases for a city of nearly 3 million.  The region of Lazio, which includes Rome, had 1,545 current cases and 1,723 positive tests.  Nationally for a population of just under 6 million there were 54,030 current cases, 6,820 had died and 8,326 had recovered.  The daily death count continued to rise, but the number of new cases was down for 3 days.  Since then deaths are still high, but flattening, and the number of people in ICU and the number of new cases daily continues to fall.  It's a ragged trend down, but encouraging.  Now Lazio has 3,448 cases with a total of 4,266 testing positive.  Nationwide out of 143,636 positive tests there are 96,877 active cases.

At the same time, Santa Clara County, California had 375 confirmed cases for a population of just under 2 million.  They are now up to 1,442 cases which is a lot, but is far from the catastrophic spike that everyone had worried about and a much better situation than Italy is facing and what is happening in New York.  Of course these numbers are all questionable because of limited testing in both places.  Some scientists have a theory that the virus arrived in California last fall and there is now a degree of herd immunity in the area.  There are studies going on now to test for virus antibodies.  We'll soon see if that is the case or not.  It now appears that the situation in California is moving in the right direction with the number ICU patients coming down just a bit.

We are settling into a new routine in a new place.  The celebrations have continued.  We celebrated two birthdays, including My Boy's 15th birthday.  How did he get so old and so tall?  He is now taller than me and closing in on Dad.  We got him a book called Bad Days in History.  It was fun to see what bad thing happened on each of our birthdays.

We celebrated carbonara day.  Carbonara is a classic Roman pasta dish with a few simple ingredients, eggs, pasta, pepper, pancetta, parmesean, and pecorino.  Our home made version was tasty, but nothing compared to the carbonara at Core de Roma, our favorite neighborhood pasta/pizza place.

This weekend is Easter, making tomorrow Good Friday.  Last weekend our church had our twice yearly general conference.  It was unusual this year in that the only people physically attending were the speakers and those giving prayers.  Even the choir music was prerecorded.  The messages were encouraging and inspiring.  Our church president called for Good Friday to be a day of prayer and fasting for members of our church and all of God's children who might wish to join us.  During this day of devotion we will pray for healing, "that the present pandemic may be controlled, caregivers protected, the economy strengthened, and life normalized."   Anyone is welcome to join in any way they feel would contribute to the spirit of the day.