Trying to Deal with the Virus.

My wife and I aren’t going to take any chances. We’re hunkering down here at home for as long as it takes. It’s been a month and a new routine has evolved and it’s working. So far.

A wonderful little grocery store near us is offering a great service: Email your shopping list to them and, when they have it ready, they call to have you come get it. They load it into your car and all you have to do is sign the charge slip.

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In terms of our daily activities, nothing much has changed. In fact, things seemed almost normal. Then, about a week ago, I began to experience what I can only describe as an uneasy feeling—as though I had forgotten something important. It went on for a few days until, in a moment of clarity, I realized what the problem was and where the vague feeling of anxiety was coming from. There weren’t any planes! 

Commercial jets coming from the mainland are preparing to land when they pass almost directly over our house. It’s a long, gradual descent and they’re still a few thousand feet above us and a bit to the north, so the noise is not an issue. Nevertheless, I do hear them and I often stop what I’m doing and watch them . . . especially the Hawaiian Airlines jets. They have the most beautiful livery of all the airlines coming here: a mostly white plane against the deep blue sky. 

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These days it’s different. Instead of four or five planes an hour passing above us, we see one or two a day.  Maybe. A few days ago there was a story in The Maui News: there were no flights from the U.S. mainland had landed at the Maui airport on the previous day. Not one.

.That’s a sobering realization for an economy that is almost totally dependent on tourism.