Hello again.
Things have certainly changed since I last wrote. This new and novel coronavirus has been throwing us all for a loop. I left for a medical conference on March 10th and the very next day, my hospital mandated all permanent employees stay in the region. Since I was already gone, I attended my conference in Colorado Springs.
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| My roomies and I for the conference |
The conference was still really good (I love AAO Convocation) though many of the atendees had to cancel and we were trying to follow makeshift regulations during the program. Because no more than 250 people were supposed to gather in one space, the conference center had to be opened up further and all of our chairs were placed 6 feet apart. The regulations got stricter as the days passed and by the end of the week, there were concerns for travel restrictions to fly home. I was planning to stay in Colorado to go skiing with my brother and sister-in-law but the resorts all closed. So my choices were to fly back to Alaska early or go somewhere else. I needed a break from Kotzebue so decided to fly to Washington DC to be with my brother for a few days. It was a wonderful break despite having limited options and trying to adhere to social distancing. The best part was the DC cherry blossoms were in full bloom, so we were able to walk outside and enjoy the beauty.
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| My nephew Dudley |
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| Beautiful DC cherry blossoms |
I returned to Kotzebue on 3/20/20. I thought I would be mandated to quarantine at home x 14 days. However, initially, my work let me back into the hospital with the caveat that I wear a mask and get my temperature checked twice daily x 14 days. But as of today, I'm self-quarantining while working at home for the remainder of my 14 days. So far, I'm feeling fine.
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| Following the rules with my mask on while at work |
Thankfully, I live in the perfect place for this quarantine as I have plenty of food and supplies. We have always stockpiled since there aren't affordable stores here- brilliant. For now, social gatherings have been cancelled, including hanging out in the hospital lobby or cafeteria, which was the norm for many townspeople. We now have people at the hospital entrance screening patients. And if they don't meet criteria or don't have an appointment, they're sent away. Patient appointments have been either converted to tele-visits or post-poned unless they are approved to be seen in person. We've always done tele-visits for village patients, so it hasn't been too difficult to incorporate this for our local patients as well. Of course, there are limitations when we don't get to see people in person or check their vital signs (temperature, blood pressure, etc). But we do our best.
A permanent provider left at the end of February, so I have taken over her panel of patients. What that means is I have been reassigned from my original village of Point Hope to Noatak. I was supposed to go to Point Hope next week for the last time but that has been cancelled due to COVID. So now I need to move on and figure out this new village of mine. I've heard it's beautiful there, inland and right along a river. With trees, oh how I've missed having trees!
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| Portrait taken for a mailing being sent to my new village, Noatak |
The days are getting longer here in Kotzebue. We currently have more than 12 hours of sunlight, and that will only increase. It's just now starting to get light when I walk to work just before 8am. But it's still light until after 9pm. Pretty soon, I'll need to close the shades in my bedroom so I 'm not kept up all night.
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| Giant icicles- a result of warmer days |
It's also started being warmer this month. The winter was much colder than recent years, consistently in the negative degrees Fahrenheit. However, it's been in the positives the last couple weeks. Because of this, it's snowing more. In the 2 weeks I was gone, it snowed several feet and the piles of snow on the sides of the road are impressive.
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| Snow piling 1/2 way up my windows, partially blocking my view of the beautiful lagoon |
Walking to work is a bit more challenging with all this snow. There's often several new inches overnight, so walking requires more effort to move my boots along. However, I got some cross country skis in January and that's been great. Unfortunately, I slipped on some ice while cross country skiing earlier this month and hurt my wrist. It's a lot better now but has made me wary of skiing on the roads which tend to be more slick. Instead, I prefer to ski on the water (lagoon, sound) where the snow is less compact and there's less to slip on.
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| My neighbor and I, heading out on a ski |
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| A random caribou hoof we encountered on one of our walks |
It's been fun to watch dog sled teams out on the lagoon. The Ididerod (big dog sled race from Anchorage to Nome) was at the beginning of the month and it was all over the news. The Kobuk 440 is a smaller race that starts and ends in Kotzebue. It was supposed to happen in April though it's been officially cancelled due to COVID (
http://www.thearcticsounder.com/article/2012kobuk_440_cancelled_in_light_of_covid-19). So unfortunately I won't get to experience the excitement of the actual race, but I get a front row seat to watch some teams that are out for a run and it's fabulous.
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| A small dog team pulling both a sled and their cross country skiing leader- he took a big spill soon after this pic! |
So, stay well! I do hope this virus gets defeated soon though it's hard to know when. I want to be able to get out when I need to, and the only way for that to happen is for COVID to take a hike.
