in the beginning
Where do I begin? Oh yes, somewhere near the beginning of March, 2020, some buzzword going around called ‘bokonamirus’ (see ‘Notes’ below for meaning). I got it! There is a new flu bug going around, making people kind of nervous, more nervous than usual at this time of year, being in the middle of the flu season.
Well, I didn’t think much of it at first, having seen this sort of thing happen before, in 2009 (*1*1), in 2003 (mars), and every year people always so eager to line up for their annual flu shot. I never had a flu shot in my life (and at this writing I’m 71), never panicked, and rarely got sick with anything other than a mild cold. I say rarely, because I have had the flu three times in my life that I can remember, the first time as a teenager and the last about 10 years ago. Never did anything about it except stayed in bed, ate chicken soup, took aspirin (I think), and got over the unpleasant experience in about a week. Each time, though, I landed in bed after abusing my immune system by exposing myself to extreme cold (Canadian winters, eh!) without dressing appropriately.
I noticed something different this time, though. Every time I went to a coffee shop and asked for a mug for my coffee (I prefer to taste the coffee, not the cardboard or plastic), the response was invariably ‘can’t give out mugs any more, you have to settle for a paper cup’. ‘Bokonamirus’ I replied? A polite nod.
At one ‘upscale’ coffee shop, I was amused when I got a paper plate for my dessert (instead of china), a paper cup for my coffee (instead of my prefered ‘china mug’), and, believe it or not, a wooden, and I mean ‘made of out wood’ fork (instead of silverware)! Now that takes the cake!
No more china mug, eh? Well, I did have a ceramic travel mug at home that I purchased months before that I never got around to using yet (find it hard to start a new habit). So now I have a chance (have to now) to use it. The barrista wouldn’t pour the coffee into my mug for me, though, lest it had the plague. In any case, it was ‘verboten’ (German for forbidden). I had to pour it myself, as quickly as possible, to minimize the transfer of cardboard and plastic coating into my coffee, from the paper cup into my mug, like some high school chemistry experiment.
last dine-in day at coffee shop
Sitting in one of my favourite coffee shops, drinking coffee from my travel mug (after carefully pouring from the paper cup, already getting used to that), the manager, obviously in some altered anxiety state, began informing customers, whatever few were left, myself and my wife included, that, as of the next day, the coffee shop will be closed until further notice, again because of this ‘bokonamirus’.
Wow, I thought, this must be more serious than I had previously thought! Is this going to be for every coffee shop in Toronto (Canada)? What about the rest of the province? I am, of course, willing to travel outside the city to find one that will still be open.
No luck. They are closing them all everywhere! And not just coffee shops, but restaurants, movie theatres, ‘non-essential’ businesses …
Notes
1. this is part one of this series
2. about the word bokonamirus: substitute the letter c for the letter b, the letter r for the letter k, and the letter v for the letter m and you get the ‘c’ word, a word I choose not to speak or think about, because doing so embeds it in the subconscious, making something real out of something that may be false. You see, the more one uses a certain word or expression, the more it and its implications become part of one’s reality, reality as one perceives it, not necessarily the reality behind the facade or illusion that the word creates.
3. about the word *1*1: substitute the letters h and n respectively for the asterisks.
4. about the word mars: substitute the letter s for the letter m
Next: Bokonamirus 2020 two — D day and the days that followed
(includes reference to James Book of Revelation: One)