She spoke the required phrases, asked the critical questions, and verified the risks and consequences of what I was about to do.  She looked directly into the eyes of my masked face and smiled while clarifying one more time, “Are you ready to do this? It’s finally your turn now!” I’ve been through childbirth, surgeries, countless medical procedures, chemotherapy, and too many pokes and prods to count, but this was somehow different. This was working to save not only my life, but those around me. This was barely out of a research lab with rapid trial studies. This was being injected into my body with the intention of starting an immune response war. This was my first physical dose of hope.

An emotional release from the past year rippled through my entire body as she prepped my arm for the injection. I thought about my grandmother who lost her mom during the 1918 pandemic and carried a homemade cloth covering for her mouth and nose in her pocketbook until the day she died. I flashed-back to the time I lined up with my first grade class in the school gym for my first polio cube (something us “boomers” understand and never take for granted).  I remembered my friends and family infected and forever affected by the virus and the outcomes in this past year.  I pondered the vast interruptions of daily lives and how everything was stirred-up the world-over. I reflected on the millions of lives lost around the world to something few saw coming and the families still grieving. I considered my overwhelming gratitude for the remarkable amount of collaboration, communication, creativity, and problem solving in the past year being injected into my muscle, and the tears flowed in relief and hope. As my nurse attached the bandage, she wept with me.

This past year of pandemic mayhem with quarantine, anxiety, fear, sadness, loneliness, loss, and so much more, is about to turn a corner, at least for some. While this first shot will not cure everything, it gives a new dose of hope moving forward for my family. I realize how fortunate I am to receive it. I realize everyone cannot or may not choose to take a vaccine. All I control are my personal attitude and effort, and both were celebrating in silent tears of relief through a dose of hope.

Washington Irving said it like this: “There is a sacredness in tears. They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love…” 

May these unexpected tears of overwhelming relief from this first dose of hope power me onward. May the emotional release and the strength of this first dose begin shifting all the unfamiliar of this collective experience into a new familiar filled in love.  May we all find little ways to help one another move forward, assisting and sharing our burdens and blessings, as we begin to emerge and rebuild on the other side. And for today, may I breathe easier as I nurse this sore arm, be kind to my fighting body and exhausted mind, and thank the angels sent my way to see me through the pandemic wilderness. And may you find and thank your angels too; may you be blessed and be a blessing of love to others, my friends. 🙂