I have a confession to make. I think I am slowly losing my brain. No, I don’t have dementia or Alzheimer’s. I have Coviditis. It’s a new condition that began in early March and has been attacking me from all sides. I thought it would go away, disappear, anything but stay attached to my body. In order to keep it at bay I’ve tried various remedies that I would like to share with you.

In our basement I had three tables filled with pictures. These pictures are what I fondly called “my picture project.” Whenever the muse began to talk to me about placing them in order and putting them in photo albums, I would come up with a myriad of reasons to be doing something else, anything but get to work on them before I died and my children would just throw them all out.

Then Coviditis began, and so did the need to complete this project. It has taken six months, but it is just about complete, and I wish I could say that I am doing the happy dance, but instead I am just relieved that my children won’t throw them out.

You may be asking why did it take me that long to finish this project? Well, and here is another confession. I have become addicted to Candy Crush, and so I would find myself sitting at my computer playing this game for hours. I would even get up in the middle of the night and play it! And yes, when I reached my thousandth game, I actually did do the happy dance! I would like to say you should have been with me to celebrate but it wasn’t really a pretty sight, and I won’t go into detail.

The other thing I became addicted to was Solitaire. Again, endless hours spent playing this card game began to make my eyes cross, and I have yet to do a happy dance.

Before you write me off as a hopeless victim of Coviditis, let me give you the good news. I learned how to use ZOOM! I knew you would find that exciting! I knew nothing about ZOOM before March, but soon was attending my Bible study via ZOOM each week, and if that wasn’t exciting enough, before long I was attending church meetings, my Nana Prayer Group, needlepoint group, game day and book discussions via ZOOM! What a delight to be able to connect with people again, I had thought we had all disappeared! We have even been able to attend church each week via our computer. What a blessing that has been.

Not only did my life come back into focus, even my book discussion at the Wade Center went to a blog sight where we could read and answer questions each week, although at one point someone told me I was a curly writer and she was kind enough to explain what I had said to the rest of the group (would that have happened if we had been meeting in person? It just made me smile and I chalked it up to Coviditis.

Wait there’s more. I took a class on Martin Luther offered by Dallas Theological Seminary and found it fascinating, That led to more book buying on Amazon—books by David Jeremiah, Erwin Lutzer, Charles Spurgeon, Amy Carmichael, to name a few.

To help me refocus, I took a three-day class on writing, and realized that I have to let Candy Crush and Solitaire become less important in my daily routine (this might be a problem). Now I have another project to accomplish. I have a file drawer filled with writing ideas that I must peruse and do something about. I must, I repeat, I must stay away from Candy Crush!

Another beautiful thing has been the staff at our church. They have called, sent notes of encouragement and prayed for us. Never underestimate what a phone call or note can do to a victim of Coviditis.

The biggest effect of Coviditis has been on my awareness of God and my daily Bible reading. I’ve gotten through 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, just finished Ezra, read a psalm and a proverb daily. If it weren’t for this book, I do believe that Coviditis would have poured its debilitating effects into my very soul.

It would have left me frightened of what I watch on the news. It would have left me feeling very alone even with my husband in the house. It would have unnerved me in a million ways. However, Coviditis has done none of this, because when I read the Word of God each day I am reminded to “stay strong and courageous,” to rely on God, to turn to him with every thought (small or large, he likes to hear them all), and to know that he is in control and has a plan. I have to say I hope the plan is to rapture his children sometime soon, because the more Coviditis hangs around, the more I long to be in our heavenly home, but I am putting my faith in our Redeemer, and not getting to game 2000 in Candy Crush.