"It's a VUCA World"

 At the beginning of the pandemic (what feels like 100 years ago) our church posted daily messages of encouraging words. When the pandemic seemed to both not be going away and feeling more under control, the messages were less frequent, then eventually stopped as we were living in a hybrid world.

Since Christmas we are returning to a virtual world. A world of virtual school. A world of curbside pick up for our library books. A world of virtual church. A world of virtual jury duty. 

It is hard. We finally let our collective guards down enough to celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas together, and a new COVID variant (named Omicron) took advantage of the situation. As of this writing (first week of January 2022) it is much more contagious than past variants, but much less deadly (especially with those who are vaccinated and boostered). Unfortunately it does break through the vaccines, but at this point feels more like an ordinary cold.

The challenge with this strain is finding a place with COVID tests available to find out if you have a cold or COVID. If you can get a test, the most accurate ones take three days to pass along the results. If you were with someone who recently tested positive (like we were on Christmas), even if you don't have symptoms, you should get a test in five days. Again, where? The over the counter tests are sold out. I could have possibly had a rapid test for $199. I didn't feel it was worth $199 to be tested for an illness I had no symptoms for.

When Louise, an associate pastor at my church, emailed me to say the church was cancelling indoor activities, including our women's bible study, I was reminded of this video by a wise woman (Louise) talking about how we are entering a VUCA world which will be full of starts and stops. VUCA=Volitile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous. Certainly sounds like life over the past 22 months. 

Meanwhile, life goes on. In two days Ashley returns to campus. Don, Yoran, and myself are hunkering down under a blanket of new fallen snow.