John Spevak: Being grateful while sheltering at home

Living in self-isolation during the coronavirus shutdown have given all of us more time to think. I have found that during this time my most fruitful thoughts have been of gratitude.

It’s been easy to have discouraging thoughts. Will this ever end? Will the virus find me or my loved ones? If so, will we recover? Can we ever get back to normal?

But thoughts like those tend to paralyze me. In between reading and listening to classical music, I decided to focus during this Easter season on reflections which enable me to move forward, especially thoughts of gratitude--for what I have now and what I’ve had in the past.

As I wrote in a column earlier this month, I’m grateful to all the people who have been putting their lives on the line for the rest of us, especially doctors, nurses, nursing assistants and other hospital, clinic and assisted living workers.

I’m grateful to others directly in the line of virus fire--police officers, fire fighters and EMTs, especially in my community, who deal with whatever and whomever they encounter, even if a person might be carrying the coronavirus. First responders, like medical personnel, are brave people vital for our survival.

Many other persons have also had to keep working to enable the gears of our social mechanism to operate while the rest of us shelter in place. They include other people who directly help meet our basic needs by continuing to work in grocery and drugs stores.

I’ve also been thinking of other people, for whom I’m grateful, who have put their lives on the line, to greater or lesser degrees, to keep us functioning. I’m grateful, for example, to people who work for the post office, UPS, Fed Ex and other firms who sort and bring letters and parcels to our home, saving us the exposure of going out into the world, as well as restaurant workers who cook and deliver meals to our homes.

I’m also grateful for people who repair cars and work in auto part stores, for those who work in hardware stores (large and small) and for those who drive trucks (in long or short hauls)--all of whom are needed to keep us going.

I’m also grateful for journalists as they try to report news and stories with currency and accuracy, on the national, state and especially local level. If we ever needed good journalism, especially locally, it’s now.

I am grateful to those helping the most in need, including the homeless, like the Salvation Army and Bethel Community Church in Los Banos.

I’m grateful to those public servants (I choose this phrase instead of “politicians”) at the national, state and local level who are truly concerned about their constituents and have made the lives of people and their safety paramount.

I’m grateful, too, for teachers. K-12 teachers are at home continuing to think about their students and emailing them and their parents homework assignments. College teachers, from community college to university instructors, including professors at the Los Banos and Merced Campuses of Merced College, have been intensely at work teaching from their homes, undertaking a massive transition of all their classes to online teaching and learning.

Within the past month or so, every teacher who had been in a college classroom is now at home on her or his computer teaching online, even persons who’ve never taught online before. I’m grateful, too, for all the people behind the scenes--college administrators and classified staff--who have worked hard in a very short period of time to make this happen.

And I’m appreciative of college students, including those who have never taken an online class before, who continue to persevere in a radically different educational environment.

I’m grateful for people of all faiths who have met the spiritual needs of their flocks during this time when churches have been shuttered by broadcasting and streaming religious services and programs or connecting via email or Facebook.

In troubled times, people of faith have traditionally found comfort by gathering and praying together. Now these gatherings must take place in spirit only, which in many ways is appropriate.

Yes, there’s a lot to be grateful for during this time of isolation, to all the people who make it possible for us to survive while being isolated.

Of course, I’m most grateful to my family, neighbors and friends--people dear to me who stay in contact by phone, text or email. Hearing the “voice” of a person who cares about you, whether on the phone or in the words of a text or email, is a source of great comfort.

I’m especially grateful to my wife Sandy. We have spent a lot of time together, just the two of us, and we have realized that being best friends, as well as in love, has made the time not just bearable but enjoyable.

As I further reflect, I’ve found myself extending my gratitude to everyone in my life of 74 years who has offered kindness, humor, encouragement and support to me--and that’s a long, long list of people.