Today has been a special one for me. I finished putting photos with captions in the final chapter of our history of West Danville. Patty and Dot have finished their chapters and all we have now are finishing touches and then it goes to our editor for a final read-through. It's almost like sending a child off to college.

I'm not going to dwell on the weather here - it's that awful. I looked out a few minutes ago and the trees are covered with snow, there seems to be at least three inches on the deck - and still snowing. I'm afraid there could be another seven inches to clear off by morning. No real warming trend until about Wednesday, according to the forecast. It's a little depressing, but there are other things that counterbalance the dreadful weather, and I prefer to think about those instead of grumbling.

Last week we lost our internet service. I think it was on Thursday. Normally it wouldn't bother us very much, but Fred was wanting to monitor on-line dues for Joe's Pond Association to be sure that was running smoothly (it always does, but he worries a lot), and I was facing a deadline to get my part of the history book finished (May 10th) and really, really needed to be able to fact check on line. But it just wasn't there. Fred finally got through to Spectrum service and after spending most of the day trying and failing to get us going by whatever on-line methods they have, they promised to send someone the next morning. Normally that would not cause any concern, but these days, we had to think hard about how to handle a stranger coming into our house and possibly bringing the dreaded virus with him from some other visit.

We swallowed hard and made our plans - masks, alcohol spray at the "ready," appropriate distancing, no contact and complete sanitizing afterwards. So Friday we were a little nervous, but ready.

The young man came promptly at 8 o'clock, just as they said he would. He wore gloves, a mask and covers on his feet. We went to the door an told him to come in as he was coming up the driveway, then we retreated a safe distance. As he opened the door he said, "Hi, I'm Aaron. You folks feeling ok today?" We said yes, we're fine. "I'm not sick, either," he said, and stepped inside. We pointed the way to the router or whatever it's called and he went to work. A few minutes later he had us going again - it wasn't our equipment, it was something wrong with Spectrum, he said, no charge. And he was gone. Easy as that. Such a nice young man, quiet, efficient, and I felt confident he hadn't brought any bad germs with him. But I sanitized anyway. I'm not about to take chances.
Altogether, it was a really nice experience and we both said we wished we could have actually seen his face. We wouldn't recognize him if we saw him again. Turns out son Jamie knows him and agrees he's a really nice person. We are glad Spectrum is handling this pandemic thing well. For some of us, the internet is especially important these days of being mostly at home. I still need only one hand to count the number of people I've talked to in person in the past couple of months.