Things happen. Nothing in life is predictable. Life can be strange. Consider the SARS-CoV-2 virus, a tiny speck of highly infectious material seeking haven in the human body and once there holding it hostage to change. For some that invasion has relatively mild consequences, for some none at all, while for many others the results are catastrophic, and for those who lose their lives, they have lost everything.

There is no such thing as excess caution, to avoid contamination with this virus eager to take possession of the human body, wreaking havoc in the respiratory tract, the heart, causing stroke. No one knows, among the scientific community desperately studying this new coronavirus whose origins were in other animals than humankind, how each individual body will manage to cope. What is known is that those people who are elderly, who are health-compromised, who have chronic illnesses and diseases which impact deleteriously on their immune system, are particularly at risk.

My husband and I are considered elderly, approaching our mid-80s, in addition to which we are both heart patients with high cholesterol and high blood pressure, but we are in fairly good physical condition. Our way of life makes it so, and no doubt our inherited genetic predisposition is also involved.

We exercise regularly, we keep our minds active, reading and writing, we enjoy nutritional food as far from the processed kind as is possible. So last night and this morning presented an anomaly in our experience. We both read in bed before sleep. Yesterday I was deep in a suspenseful description of a 1994 Canadian expedition on Mount Everest, and it was gripping. I read for longer than I meant to, which isn't unusual.

But when I put out my bedside lamp I had difficulty falling asleep. It seemed to me as though I had been awake all night. And I felt awful physically. I was aware that my stomach seemed distended, that I felt nauseous, and I felt chilled. I could have pulled up a heavier blanket folded at the end of the bed, but couldn't muster the energy to do it. My throat was sore, but I have congenital sinusitis, so it's hard to breathe through my nose and I tend, when I fall asleep to breathe with an open mouth, the result of which is a dry mouth and a sore throat.

My husband slept soundly beside me, and I didn't want to either awaken or alarm him. I left our bed for the bathroom and then began a bout of diarrhoea and with it the nausea increased and I retched. this was repeated. By this time, needless to say, my husband was awake. I crept back into bed absolutely miserable. One swell after another of nausea, affecting my breathing. Jackie and Jillie comforted me, their warm little bodies beside mine. My husband sat on the loveseat, not knowing what was next, what to do, should he call our doctor, take me to emergency?

He let me sleep. And sleep I did. Until eleven, when he gently woke me. And I felt perfectly normal. And the remainder of the day proceeded as it normally does. I baked a cheesecake for dinner dessert, prepared a chicken soup, made a bread dough. My husband did a bit of light vacuuming to prevent me from doing it, but I could have.

And then, when all was done we went out on a cool 17C, very windy day for our usual hike through the forest trails, Jackie and Jillie primed and ready to go. Today is the day that just about everything is opening up here. Release from lockdown. People have been thronging malls and retail outlets, starved for normalcy. The thought of course, the very first thought we shared, my husband and me, was COVID-19. Some of what I experienced could have been symptoms. If that was the case, would I feel normal, and set about our usual routine? Heaven knows. We keep our distance from others and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

We took a longer than usual circuit through the forest trails. We did come across some young people walking contentedly together, other young teens on their bicycles. And to our astonishment, a first; someone was driving a street-licensed all-terrain vehicle through the trails, zipping about at top speed, a child of about 5, helmet on, but otherwise unsecured behind him. Motorized vehicles of any kind are forbidden in such an environment. There are places, including some of the bridges that the width of the vehicle presented as an obstacle. But obviously this fellow didn't care; he simply changed course.

As he charged up one of the hills at top speed, my husband stopped him briefly to inform him of what he was already without doubt  aware; that he presented a danger to other people using the trails, and being there on such a vehicle was illegal. Signs are posted at all ravine entrances forbidding entry to any such vehicles. When he noticed I was taking a photograph of the vehicle, the man stepped on the gas and whipped up the hill, and away.

The world can be a strange place, inhabited by peculiar people.