December 9, 2020: All We Wanted for Christmas Was a Vaccine, and We Got Several!

Apparently, Christmas tree sales are booming, which makes sense. People who are home will have more time to admire their tree, and smell that wonderful smell. And a Christmas tree provides light and cheer, particularly helpful right now. 

The NYT article about this boom can’t quite settle on whether it is caused by panic-buying or some weird hoarding thing (though they did NOT report people with 20 trees in the basement), or whether people just bought their trees early because why wait, or whether zillions of people who never had a tree before are thinking this seems like a good year to start (they found one such person).

It’s a pretty incoherent article, so, until proven otherwise, I’m going with “mostly, people bought earlier than usual.” But the good news is: people in the Christmas tree biz are having a strong season, so more power to them!

We’ll head out for our tree in a couple of days, when our self-imposed post-travel quarantine ends. Although the Times says some lots are already picked clean, the Times isn’t based in Oregon, land of many trees. I think we’ll be okay. In the UK, where there’s no Thanksgiving holiday to mark the kickoff to Christmas, people decorate any time after Halloween. Late in November, I heard a radio host say that anyone who hadn’t decorated yet should be ASHAMED, which I thought was harsh, and smacking of Christian (or maybe Christian/Druid?) triumphalism. 

Still. I love looking in windows at shining trees on a dark night, and I like homemade decorations, like this year’s favorite. I’m calling it “Disillusionment sets in early.”

Speaking of presents, how cool is it that COVID vaccines are starting to get approved and even distributed? WooHOO! And such high effectiveness rates, higher than we had any reason to hope for! I know the virus continues to spread, and it will be a wait for the vaccine for most of us. I know there’s a huge task ahead in educating those who are reluctant or phobic or misinformed.

I know the wealthy countries have bought up most of the supply, and that if we don’t vaccinate all over the world, the virus will spread for years, endangering the vulnerable everywhere. I know that people too selfish to wear a mask will probably be too selfish to get a shot. I know some of the early recipients have had allergic reactions.

I know the outgoing incompetents didn’t even create a well-thought-out distribution plan, but found time to require states to gather names, birthdates, ethnicities and addresses of those who get vaccinated (and that there is concern this is an attempt to frighten the undocumented. More vaccine for the rest of us! Except it doesn’t work that way, I know.)

I know! 

And that’s just some of the nonsense on the vaccine side of things, not the economic side, the racial-justice side, the societal-divide side, or the let’s-see-if-we-can-manage-a-coup side. I get it! Things are not rosy!

But I believe we need to practice some serious compartmentalization.

We need to take the wins, when we get them, because if we are never happy, if we never drink the champagne, then the bad guys have triumphed. Before we drop straight into Whatabout Gloom, or maybe as a way to crawl back up out of it, I want to stop and give a resounding cheer that effective vaccines got developed and are starting to trickle out. Let’s hear it for the great gifts of science!