Unknown Unknowns

Context: I live in Redmond, less than 10 miles where the first death from COVID-19, the Novel Coronavirus, occured in the USA. As you can imagine, my community is in a state of mild panic.

Here we go, another week we have been blessed with.

A week ago – COVID-19 was a world away. Tonight – my family excitedly reported that you can find toilet paper at Fred Meyer.

Jason asked if he was going to school tomorrow.

Jada is praying that schools are cancelled for the reminder of the year.

My city is in the odd place between finding unity in the sharing of information and frustration with those who recklessly share misinformation.

Fear is high, tempers are short, confusion in some, denial in others.

Our children are watching, and measuring how to respond by how we respond.

This is in the place that we enter into the week.

Today I was discussing with someone how unused to this emotion we are as a society. Uncertainty, things we do not know.

We are so used to knowing things.

2–3% death rate versus .1%, 99.9% effective – we live with the assurance of these numbers. We find peace in a percentage, especially when we find ourselves in the positive side of that number. We assure ourselves that we have done all we can to put ourselves in the good side of the odds we face.

It wasn’t that long ago that families expected to lose a child to a virus or tragedy. Everyone knew someone who had tuberculosis or polio or a bad reaction to a childhood disease. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful for where we are today!! I’m grateful for the individual decisions I can make, and the collective decisions we have made as a society that has meant my children have very little exposure to anything life threatening. Even my son – who has faced several deadly conditions is blessed by God’s grace often delivered through the hands of incredibly trained medical professionals. He is an adult that at any earlier time, and in most places in the world, would not have made it to adulthood.

If I had been born with my son’s heart, I would not have made it for the procedure he had at birth was not invented yet.

If he was born a year later, we possibly could have corrected his heart before he was even born, that is how quickly medicine has changed and is changing.

All of this means, I am unused to uncertainty. I’m more used to it than most, but I feel in my bones my discomfort with the unknown. My urge to read more, seek expert advise, ponder and speculate. My desire, when I can’t know, to turn away and become willingly blind to something that brings me the uncomfortable emotions the unknown can bring.

Unknown is scary.

Unknown unknowns is scarier.

Easier to ignore and distract and deny.

What if there is something to be found in the unknown that we can’t find when we live in certainty? What good is peace if we only feel it when we are assured of it’s percentage? How do we know we have faith, when we constantly put ourselves in positions not to need it?

I’m not speaking of recklessness risk. I guess I’m speaking of one of the things that makes life so precious. At any given moment we take one breath and experience one heartbeat, we live. Fully grasping the fragileness of the single breath and heart beat, changes how our mind and soul relates to the preciousness of those moments. Wrestling with the possiblity of fewer breathes and beats than we hoped for gives us space to consider how we use those breathes and beats more fully. We can also venture into deeper realities, when we allow ourselves to dwell here.

So before we plug back in, or unplug as your personal case may be, to the frenzy – breath, feel your heartbeat. Consider what you will do with the ones you will have this week.

• Will you love more?
• Will you break the silence that has grown too long?
• Will you meet your neighbor?
• Will you find peace in your imperfect past?
• Will you find an anchor in the present and experience this week and all it has to offer?

Some questions I’m asking myself. I don’t know what this week will bring. I know I am thankful for it and for the chance to explore some of these questions with those around me.