The Covid Status in Peru

Covid-wise things seem to be easing up in the US, at least that's my impression. Hospitals in my area are not near capacity and I've noticed that some folks who in the past were reluctant to be vaccinated are now getting their shots. There are countries in the rest of the world that are not doing so well including my second country Peru.

This is from the US Embassy in Lima:

"On April 17, 2021, the Government of Peru announced additional mitigation measures due to high levels of COVID-19 spread.

Starting today, April 19, 2021, businesses in areas of Extreme alert level must now close three hours before curfew.  Currently, in Lima and other areas of Extreme alert, curfew is at 9:00 p.m. and businesses must now close no later than 6:00 p.m.  In areas of Peru in Moderate, High, or Very High alert, businesses must close no later than two hours before the local curfew.

In addition to face masks, face shields must be worn to enter many establishments, including shopping centers, markets, supermarkets, department stores, and other potentially crowded places."

For my friends and family's sake I am glad that strict curfews are in place and masks and face shields are mandatory. I am told that getting vaccinated is not mandatory but even if it were at the moment supply is very limited. The Lambayeque Region, where I lived and Maribel's family lives has a population of over 32 million but so far the region has received just 9,000 doses. Initially Peru purchased the Chinese vaccine among others but now is also receiving Pfizer, Johnson and Moderna. The Lambayeque Region is in the extreme alert category. Hospitals in Chiclayo, our home town are at full capacity. 

Maribel's father was vaccinated this morning at a school near their home. His daughter Magali was not as the vaccine is strictly limited to those over 80. 

There are some Peruvians, just like people here who say they will refuse the vaccine when it is offered. We have already lost several friends and distant relatives to the virus. Maribel's nuclear family is on-board with the masks, face shields and the vaccine when available. Maribel is working hard to convince the reluctant ones to get the vaccine, and is offering up our own experience with it as an example.

Bombin' the Ave

It was 1954 and I was involved in one of the many early to mid teenage infatuations that were customary and almost obligatory in those days. I remember the year because that's when "our song" came out - The High and the Mighty. Every couple had to have a song, one that typified their undying love for each other. Whenever it played on the radio you'd hold hands, look into each other's eyes and talk about forever. Many of the kids; that's what we were, chose The High and the Mighty because the beautiful music and romantic lyrics stirred the emotions. There were a boatful of other "our songs" but at the moment the only one I can recall is Little Darlin by the Diamonds. It's funny how you can go from a love struck teen who can't wait to see her that night and doesn't sleep well from thinking about her, to an old man 67 years later who can't even remember her name, what she looked like, how long we were together or anything at all about her. I may have met her at school or some social activity but there's a good chance that I first saw her while bombin' the ave.

That's what you did at night if you were unattached and looking for some action, you bombed the avenue. In Milwaukee what that meant is that you slowly cruised up and down Wisconsin Avenue checking out the girls who were walkin' the ave, usually in twos because there were usually two guys per car. When you (the guys) spotted something that looked interesting you'd slowly pull over to the curb and deliver your pickup line. It was decided in advance who would do the talking and whose turn it was to get the good lookin' one. See, for some reason almost always one of the two girls was good lookin' and the other was semi-good lookin'. We used to think that the good lookin' one did that deliberately to make herself look better. 

Me and my buddy Jerry who was a couple of years older than me had an advantage. Jerry had dropped out of school at 16, got himself a job at a grocery store unloading trucks, stocking shelves and mopping floors, and was able to make a down payment on a brand new red Ford convertible with white interior. Girls liked convertibles because their friends could see them cruising the ave like beauty queens in a parade, and because it was easier to get out of the car quickly if the guys became too aggressive. 

When it was my turn to do the pick up line I tried to quickly assess the girls attitudes and deliver a quietly confident and intriguing line..."Hi girls...how about helping two nice guys break in this new car. We'll stick to the ave or anywhere else you'd like to go and drop you off whenever and wherever you want." Maybe half the time the girls would just keep walking but the other half they'd walk over to the car to size us up and then either get in or not. Jerry drove so I was shotgun, so I'd get out of the car and direct one of the girls to the back and then follow her in. If I had the good lookin' one I'd play it cool. If I had the other one I'd spend the evening being the clown...entertaining her and making her laugh at a distance. Once when I was in clown mode the girl stopped me and asked, "When are you going to make your move?" I honestly don't remember what happened next. Usually if things clicked you'd drive to a nearby park and get into some hot and heavy necking. If I say so myself we were fairly successful when I did the pickup line. When Jerry did it, not so much. I would always cringe thinking that his, "Hey Girls! Wooo wooo!" would never go down as one of the world's greatest pickup lines.

When you picked up girls it was never with a thought to a future relationship although sometimes it turned out to be. Usually you just dropped them off at the end of the night and never saw them again. I wonder if that girl ever thinks of me and our song The High and the Mighty?

Fast forward a couple of years to 1956. We're in the same Ford convertible, Jerry with his girl and me in back with mine (I remember her name. It was Diane). We'd been seeing these girls for several months. We were driving southwest over the railroad track bridge on Forest Home Ave near 35th Street. It was sundown and the sky was that beautiful dark pink, and the new song Canadian Sunset sung by Andy Williams was playing on the radio. I'm feeling the breeze in my hair, enjoying the sunset and the cozy feeling of the girl nestled against me, I'm 16 and thinking...man, I got the world by the ass! No way could I have imagined the twists and turns, ups and downs of the path I would walk from that moment to this. 

About Nature and a Baby Robin

Saturday April 17 - I vaguely remember finding several orphaned birds when I was a kid; bringing them home and trying to raise them. I would ask my parents what to feed them and what I could keep them in. My parents always discouraged me from keeping them. That said that baby birds sometimes fell out of nests, and either the birds parents would take care of them or they would die. I think I remember them saying something about that "being nature's way." The birds I tried to save always died and I always felt sad.

This morning we have this baby bird in our backyard. Maribel discovered it yesterday. It was laying far from any potential nesting tree. It didn't move when I approached it...simply cheeped and opened its mouth apparently expecting food. From her garden Maribel dug up several worms which the bird eagerly accepted from her fingers. Shortly after that it pooped.

We have many species of birds in our yard, with robins being the most prominent. I sometimes think about that. The robin is Wisconsin's state bird. The brown thrasher is Georgia's state bird. We see many robins here but seldom see brown thrashers. 

We don't know what species 'our' baby bird is. We watched closely to see if any of the robins, grackles, bluebirds, blue jays or cardinals showed any attachment to the baby but saw no indication of relationship with the possible exception of a pair of robins who approached the chick several times. 

When Maribel asked what we should do with the chick I told her to let it be - let nature take its course. I told her of my failures as a kid trying to raise baby birds. And there was another concern. There is a quarter-sized growth high on the left side of its back without feathers that is swollen. There's no knowing whether it's a birth defect or injury. It seems to be forcing the chick to hold its head to the right. Neither of us following my advice, we took turns digging worms and feeding the chick through the afternoon and into the early evening. As it was getting dark I saw Maribel's concern so cleaned out a large cardboard box, placed the chick inside and brought it into the garage, fully expecting to find a dead bird in the morning. 

While pouring our coffee this morning we heard loud chirps coming from the garage. And there it was, mouth wide open with an expression that to me was demanding but to Maribel was pleading to be fed. The current status is that the bird has been fed two fat worms and the box has been moved outside into the morning sun. Now the plan is to find a container to keep a ready supply of worms, and to place the bird in the grass in the same spot it was found yesterday. Hopefully a cat or hawk won't see it. 

The chick eats, poops and chirps, but that growth from yesterday hasn't changed. I don't know how this is going to play out. I think we'll give it another day or two to see what happens. Maribel asked if we should name it but I told her that giving it a name would only make her more sad if it dies, which I still believe will be the inevitable outcome. We'll see.

Sunday - What has happened so far today is not at all what I expected. The parents...that pair of robins we saw approaching the chick yesterday, appeared shortly after we placed the chick in the grass this morning and took over our feeding duties. They've been at it steadily for about seven hours. The chick is showing some mobility, though with difficulty. Still, that's better than yesterday when it couldn't move at all. 

The bad news is that the cyst or growth or whatever it is has gotten bigger. This morning Maribel administered the antibiotic ciprofloxacin mixed with water to the chick orally with an eye dropper. If that growth is the result of an infection maybe the antibiotic will help. It looks like we'll be bringing it into the house again tonight.

Monday - We took the chick into the garage again last night. When we placed it in the grass this morning the parents were there immediately and resumed feeding it. The parents approach it with food but then stand back and move away, I think trying to coax the chick to move but it repeatedly falls over when trying to move. It seems to me that at some point the parents will give up. I know I have. I don't see a future for this bird but Maribel is hopeful. As as long as the parents keep trying so will we, though I wonder if we're doing the bird a disservice by keeping it alive. I watched it for a few minutes a little while ago. It can sit up for a few moments but then falls on its face or back. This is not good.

Sometimes Maribel and me watch one of those zoo programs on television. When I see them doing x-rays, CT scans and major surgery on six-inch lizards I wonder if that isn't going to the extreme. What is the life of a six-inch lizard worth? What is the value of the injured chick's life? And how was it decided that the lives of the white rats are worth less than the medium sized carnivores they are fed to in the zoos? I think that what this is pointing to is that the value of a life is relative, though relative to what is difficult to define.

Late afternoon - The parent robins abandoned their efforts and disappeared a few hours ago. The growth on the chick is definitely a liquid filled cyst and has doubled in size since this morning. The bird is laying in its stomach, breathing but otherwise unresponsive. We talked about moving it to a far corner of the back yard but decided to let it die in the place it occupied on its last day. We'll see what the morning brings.

Tuesday - There was so much of nature on display these last three days, all of it centered around that young chick. There was the determined effort by two crows to get at the bird three different times, only to be driven off by the adult robins with help from mockingbirds (and once from Maribel). A young squirrel nervously running to and from the chick apparently trying to figure out what it was as the male robin stood nearby ready to defend. And finally the total dedication for three days of the parents, feeding, protecting and trying to coax the chick to move. 

Now it's over. The chick's brief life ended sometime last night.

When the Excitement is Gone

As I mentioned in my previous post Maribel is still having citizenship celebrations, though it was two weeks ago yesterday that she officially became a United States citizen. These last few meetings have more resembled the usual social get togethers than a celebration and Maribel's attitude toward them has been more subdued. It is obvious that the glow of the Oath Ceremony of April 1st at the USCIS building has diminished.  

Both of us remember the feeling of relief after mailing the citizenship application last May and what seemed like ten pounds of supporting documents gathered over the previous months. Now it was out of our hands. Now it was waiting for notification that the application was, a) accepted, b) rejected, or c) more information was required. 

There were high-fives and hugs and steaks on the grill along with goblets of Irish Crème the day we learned that the application had been accepted. The euphoria bubble burst a few days later when checking the status of the application we saw that the resolution date was November, 2021which at that time was fourteen months away. A few months later the date changed to May, 2021. After that events moved quickly. Maribel had her interview in mid-March; passed it, and was sworn in April 1st. And now it's over.

We talked about the evolution of the process, our feelings as each benchmark was passed and where we are now...in other words what has changed, what has been gained. In practical terms all that citizenship has given Maribel is the right to vote and to travel to countries that don't require Americans to have a visa. The intangible benefit is the pride she feels, and the relief that it is over. No more studying, memorizing, nervously checking the USCIS webpage to see if her status has changed, and no more fear that some political situation could derail her application. 

She still needs to receive her passport, and we did talk about having a 'passport party' but that's maybe going too far. When that passport arrives it will probably be just the two of us at Logan's Roadhouse, margaritas in hand and remembering briefly the citizenship experience before going on to talk of other things.  

It ain't as bad as they make it out to be

Maribel has had two "citizenship" celebrations thus far and as I type this is at another one with some lady friends. We think there will be at least one more celebration and possibly two. Part of the reason for these mini celebrations instead of one big one is that those people who have been vaccinated prefer not to mingle with the non-vaccinated, both for health concerns and the differing philosophical views. We've been trying to separate the vaccinated and the non-vaxxers but it's hard to do because there seems to be a real reluctance to talk about the subject, probably because it can lead to some heated exchanges, so we sometimes don't know who has been vaccinated and who hasn't. Maribel and I have had our shots and as a result have loosened up a bit on our activities but still exercise caution out of consideration for others.

I try to ignore the Covid issue all together because I become discouraged thinking about it but avoiding the subject is difficult. Several weeks ago we were at a restaurant having dinner with some friends when on one of the televisions there was an interview taking place outside of a business with a middle-aged couple. When the interviewer asked why they weren't wearing masks, the man replied, "It's not as bad as they make it out to be." The woman next to him dutifully nodded her head in agreement. My friend laughed and said that he'd like a dollar for every time he has heard that, and about a dozen other conspiracy theories. When I asked his opinion as to why he thought so many people displayed that attitude, his response was that there is no rational answer. I recalled his opinion today when reading an article about an interview with Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones, who said almost exactly the same thing. When asked what he thought regarding people who refuse the vaccine he said:

“Of course, there’s no point in speaking to people about it. They don’t get it,” he said. “They got what they believe in and they believe in that. And it doesn’t matter what you say, they’re gonna believe in it. And rational thought doesn’t work.” 

I don't regard Mick Jagger as an authority on anything, but in my view his opinion and that of my friend is spot on and nowhere is that more true than here in the south.

Recent CDC data shows that just 23 percent of Tennessee adults have been fully vaccinated. Only Alabama and Georgia have worse records. And it's not a matter of supply, at least for Tennessee. The latest CDC numbers show that Tennessee has received 4,671,560 vaccine doses, but administered just 3,299,283 of them. A member of Tennessee's Health Department commenting on the disparity of the numbers explained, “...but particularly in our rural areas – and we have a lot of people living in rural areas – there are people not coming forward for vaccination. We have ample appointment space, and those appointments are not being filled.” I would guess that that explanation is the same for Alabama and Georgia. 

Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia are beautiful states with lots of fine people, but the culture of fierce independence, personal freedom to the extreme (when it may adversely affect others), and mistrust of anything that doesn't support far right beliefs can be a real pain in the ass.

There is another school of thought regarding vaccinations. I refer to those in that group as the six-monthers. Their thinking is that they will wait six months to see what happens to those vaccinated before deciding to be vaccinated themselves. Whenever I have been foolish enough to point out that during that six-month period they could become infected and possibly endanger their health, or be asymptomatic and infect others thus spreading and delaying the eradication of the virus, the response is usually, "I don't believe that" or, "It ain't as bad as they make it out to be." I think they'd have a tough time selling that to the survivors of the 565,318 and counting who have died in the US from Covid.

Confessions of a former Consumer Finance Office Manager

There was a time period in my early youth when I didn't know what I wanted to do vocationally. Okay, let me be honest about this. I wasn't sure what I could do let alone wanted to do. I graduated from high school because the administration was reluctant to fail me. Seriously. I was the Master of Ceremonies at pep rallies and most other school activities, my band played at the school sock-hops, I was the lead male voice in the choir, and I gave the morning announcements from the principal's office..."Hey you Rams and Ramettes!..the wrestling team is taking on rival South Division in the gym at 4:30...let's be there to support our guys!" Nobody ever showed up to watch the wrestling team. Not even me. Wrestling is a boring spectator sport. Anyway, you don't fail a guy who is that prominent in school social activities, even if the only classes he ever passed were Choir, English, Literature and Boys Glee Club. So there I am, recently graduated with the country in the middle of a serious financial recession and manual labor jobs are tough to find and I don't have the educational background to do anything else. I remember walking in to the office of Milwaukee's Transportation Department thinking of applying for a bus driver position and telling the receptionist that I'd like to speak to the person who tells me that there are no jobs available. That got me a laugh but no job interview. 

My mother kept insisting that I should look into a career as an undertaker. She liked the image of her son working in a professional setting with a suit. My father agreed with her but for a different reason, saying, "...even you couldn't piss off dead people." I think I could but that's not relevant to this post.

One morning I was browsing through the help wanted adds when one of those Management Trainee Wanted ads caught my eye. No matter how bad times are there are always those kinds of ads, usually involving scrubbing toilets at slave wages. This one looked different so I called the number and made an appointment for an interview. 

The company was a consumer finance company, which in those days meant they made small loans to regular people. If I remember correctly the laws that governed those types of businesses limited the amount of a loan to $2500. I was interviewed by the office manager, hired, and entered a six-month training program during which we were taught to interview loan applicants, do the investigative work, and make the loan decision. Our customers were mostly people who had been refused loans by banks. As a result loans were frequently made knowing that we would have to work hard to get our money back. At the extreme of that were the deadbeats...people who skipped out or simply refused to pay. I actually enjoyed that part of the business...tracking down deadbeats and finding some sort of assets to attach. I loved it when someone who hadn't made a payment in months and in some cases years would come into the office after learning that I had discovered where they worked and garnished their paycheck. They never had the cash to settle the debt so I'd have them sign a new contract with a strong co-signer. Normally there wouldn't be a problem collecting after that. The company loved it too because the debt had been written off as uncollectable so the money recovered was pure profit.

At the completion of the training program I was promoted to manager at an office in a small central Wisconsin town. There was just me and the receptionist/secretary. The manager prior to me had made a lot of risky loans so I spent my time tracking down deadbeats. I did well and my office was near the top in Wisconsin in bad debt collected. In loans made I was near the bottom. I didn't like to make loans because I didn't like to exploit people. Let me explain that.

Most applicants never asked about the interest rate. When someone did ask I would quote directly out of the training manual..."The interest rate is 8% on the first $300 and 7% on anything over that." The response would usually be a happy, "Eight percent! That's less than the bank charges!" I would just smile and say nothing. But what I was thinking was that 'you need to add the 8 and 7 to arrive at 15%. And you didn't notice the life insurance fee or processing fee that I added to the contract for a total of 18%.'  Many of them probably would not have objected even if they had done the math, but to me I was cheating them and it bothered me.

The logical question to ask is why, after the six-month training program and a year as an office manager I suddenly developed a conscious. To this day I don't have a good answer for that. It ended when one day the area supervisor from Chicago visited my office and got on my case about my "poor loan performance." I looked at him, scribbled out a resignation, told him I didn't belong in this job and walked out. 

What prompted this post is two weeks ago Maribel and I were walking in a small nearby town when I saw the sign of a finance company that I remembered from the old days. I walked into the office, told the manager of my background and asked if he had ever heard of my old company. I was surprised when he said no because the company at that time was one of the industry leaders. I Googled the company name when I returned home and learned that it had been swallowed up and disappeared in the early 2000s after it paid a $486 million settlement for predatory lending. I've got to admit that brought a smile to my face. The phrase delayed vindication comes to mind. I wonder what they did with those old training manuals?

Squirrels in the Trees

The pink, pre-dawn light was just starting to become visible in the east when the silhouette of the squirrel emerged on the limb of an oak tree. I had been waiting, impatiently, sitting in the pitch black with my back against a tree, my rifle in my lap. The gun was an old Stevens .22 semi-auto, or was supposed to be but it never reloaded itself so I had to manually pull the bolt back after each shot. I suppose a gunsmith could have fixed it but I was sixteen in 1956 and didn't have the money for that sort of thing. At 30 yards it shot high and to the right so to compensate I had to aim low and left. 

I raised the rifle and pointed it at the outline of the sitting squirrel - it was still too dark to see either the squirrel or the rifle sights clearly and pulled the trigger. The squirrel tumbled straight down. I heard the plop as it landed in the leaves and then there was silence. What a hunter is supposed to do in that situation is to remain stationary; to let things settle down so that other squirrels in the area would resume their activity. I ran like a madman, heart racing, face and arms being whipped by brush that it was still too dark to see, to the spot where I thought the squirrel had fallen. My cap had been knocked off but I didn't stop to pick it up, being certain I could find it after the sun had risen.

When I reached the squirrel I picked it up and looked at it closely, experiencing feelings of awe and exhilaration. It was my first game, the first thing I had ever shot. As time went by I moved on to rabbits, pheasants, partridge, deer and bear hunting but it's the memory of that first squirrel that stands out when I think of my hunting years. I don't know what happened to that old Stevens rifle and have forgotten what I did with the many guns I've owned since. My plan was to pass the guns to my son and he to his son but that turned out not to be.  

Fifty years later in the early 2000s I did a lot of squirrel watching. Not hunting...those days were past. I was living in a modest house nearly surrounded by forest in northern Wisconsin. I had been living in Appleton, Wisconsin but having gone through an expensive divorce, losing a ton of money when the tech stocks crashed, languishing in a relationship that was on its last legs and being recently retired I felt the need for a change of scenery. I had hunted and fished the Crivitz, Wisconsin area for over 45 years so was familiar with the territory and when I came across a house for sale that seemed to suit me perfectly I jumped at it.

I spent a lot of time during the first year making changes to the house and garage and when I wasn't working on the house I fished, rode one of three bicycles I had, picked berries, cut firewood, and walked in the woods. In the early evening I would sit in the yard at the fire pit grilling hamburgers, drinking a beer and watching the chipmunks, squirrels and sometimes foxes and deer move through the trees. 

It was a good couple of years but after awhile I began questioning where I was in life. I was 65, had no regular job, no friends to speak of and no future plans or goals. Don't get me wrong...it was a good life and I enjoyed it, but I started thinking about choices. I could continue as I was or, being completely unencumbered I could start a whole new life. I didn't have much of a chance to pursue that thinking because fate stepped in and made the choice for me. Through a friend in Miami I met Maribel, and that changed my life dramatically and forever.

Today, at this very minute I am looking out the window from a room we call 'The Bistro' in our Georgia home at squirrels running and playing in the branches of a huge water oak. I can see Maribel in the distance planting in her garden whatever seeds she bought this morning. The question raised 15 years ago in Crivitz - do I stay the course or start a new life is no longer relevant. I am in exactly the right place, at the right time, with the right person and doing the things we both enjoy. Life sometimes works that way.

I Think, Therefore I........Don't Know

You can't walk behind a lawn mower for three hours without your mind sort of leaving your body and exploring the many thoughts that appear and disappear seemingly on their own, at least I can't. Yesterday the thought of death occupied a sizable portion of my three hours. Not in a fearful or gloomy way mind you, but as a checklist of things I have done and still need to do to have my affairs in order when my time comes. 

Many people are uncomfortable talking about death. If you mention to someone that you're planning for death the likely response will be, "Don't worry about it!...you look healthy...strong as an ox and will live to 100". It's like an admonishment that you shouldn't be thinking about death, the assumption being that you're afraid of dying. I'm not. Over 99% of all the people who have ever lived are dead. Everyone alive today will die. Everyone not yet born will die. It's not an exclusive club. My turn will come and to me it only makes sense to have my affairs in order. Planning for death has no more impact on me than planning a trip. Both start with a check list...GPS programed, check- gas tank full, check - hotel reservations made, check. There's no difference.

So I'm going to die, but right now I am a part of that tiny, infinitesimal group of people who in the scope of the universe's infinite past and future are alive at this very moment. But what does it mean to be 'alive'? What is life? Biologists, theologists and philosophers since the time of Aristotle in 350 BC and probably before then have been trying to come up with a working definition of life. To this day no one has succeeded, at least not to the point where there is agreement. It's easy to define life by its attributes and characteristics - what it looks and feels like, what it has and what it does, but that doesn't describe what it is that has those attributes and characteristics. It's like describing an elephant by saying that its big, makes a trumpeting sound, eats foliage and poops a lot. That doesn't get it.

I was about two hours into my lawn mowing task when the epiphany occurred. I came up with a definition of life, one that is so simple that I'm certain many people have thought of it and discarded it. And yet I can't think of a way to refute it. The definition I arrived at is:

Life as we know it is a self-sustaining chemical process.

That's it. That's all there is. You can try to go further but before too long you'll find yourself getting wrapped around the axle on the attributes and characteristics path. What you can say is that at some point that self-sustaining process breaks down on the individual level. Armed with my definition of life, defining death is easy. Death is the cessation life. Just like dark is the absence of light and cold is the absence of heat. Dark, cold and death are the normal state of things. Light, heat and life are transitory.

Having satisfied myself that I had come up with some good, practical definitions I switched my focus to mowing around that pesky sapling cedar that I intend to cut down when it occurred to me that I had ignored the big question. What is it that is thinking these thoughts? Is it that same self-sustaining chemical process that powers life? Somehow I don't think so. Bacteria have life but apparently not awareness. Many of the lower life forms don't exhibit the ability to reason.

Googling words such as awareness, consciousness, senscient only lead to definitions that begin with...consciousness, awareness, etc is the ability to blah blah. Again, trying to describe something by it attributes and characteristics, rather than focusing on what it is. 

I think that it is going to be a long, long time before we determine the source of consciousness. I'll probably take another shot at it during my next mowing session, but I'm not hopeful of finding the answer.

It's the Thought that Matters

On Tuesday, March 16 at the USCIS building in Montgomery, Alabama Maribel successfully passed her citizenship interview. She was told that she would be notified of the date and location of the Oath Ceremony, which completes the process. The notification arrived a week later, indicating that we had to return to Montgomery on April 1st at 9:50 AM for the ceremony. The letter stated that because the Oath Ceremony is a serious event appropriate dress should be worn. 

We were there at the appointed time and were directed to drive behind the building where there were two rows of cars. At the head of the lines we could see people standing outside of their cars, with right hand raised and presumably taking the oath. It was cold and windy - a storm had gone through the previous night followed by a cold front. The oath was administered to groups of six. When our turn came I drove the car forward as directed. As Maribel (that's her in the far center with white mask) stood next to the car, hair blowing and the paper in her hand flapping in the wind I started taking pictures. There was a staff of five, all dressed in jeans, hoodies and baseball caps. They took turns administering the oath. 

I couldn't help but ponder the moment. The attendees were informed to dress appropriately for the 'formal occasion', which it is or should be, because these people are about to become citizens of the greatest country in the world, and yet they're taking the Oath of Allegiance to the United States of America in a cold and windy parking lot and being sworn in by people dressed as popcorn vendors at a baseball game. 

But the bottom line is that she is a United States citizen, and the years of waiting and the mountain of documents accumulated over many months to prove to immigration her eligibility for citizenship is behind us. 

Yesterday morning we were at the post office bright and early to submit Maribel's application for a passport. We were told that normal processing time is ten months but we could pay an additional fee which could mean we'll receive the passport in from three weeks to three months. In the meantime we can't travel internationally until that passport arrives. 

I am proud of Maribel's accomplishment as are her friends and family. We wanted a nice celebration but because of the pandemic will have several mini-celebrations. We began last night with our friends Marge and Jim. Because of Covid we haven't been face to face in over a year. It was great to see them again.

One final ironic thought...a large part of my personal satisfaction coming with Maribel's citizenship is that when her passport arrives I will finally be done dealing with immigration. But in checking my own documents I noticed that my Peruvian passport expires next month. So one day soon we'll be visiting the Peruvian Consulate in Atlanta to renew it. More forms, more money, and more time in an immigration office.