Just one thing after another. We're coping with the novel coronavirus, taking steps we know should protect us from transmission. Our lives have been complicated. Nothing -- at least most things society takes for granted -- is quite the same any more. But this is Canada. Where case numbers are relatively low in comparison to many other parts of the world. Including our neighbour to the south, grappling to try to get a grip on their contagion and the overwhelming number of deaths caused by COVID-19.

Our economy is in shatters, many people are unemployed, food banks require more help than ever to give assistance to people in dire straits. We are reminded daily of how delicately balanced our life on this planet can be. But, again this is Canada. We're well sheltered from the disasters that strike elsewhere. As in countries in conflict, countries threatened by natural disasters causing earthquakes, floods, volcanic action.

Lebanon yesterday, was put to another kind of test when its deep-sea port at Beirut was shattered by several explosions. There are people from all over the world who migrated from their countries of birth to emigrate to Canada to become citizens and raise their families here. But they remain lovingly loyal to the country of their heritage, returning there often to touch back with families still living there. "There are no words to describe what's happening now. It's horrific. I've never seen Lebanon like this in my life. It's worse than it was during the civil war", said Ahmad Arajil, president of the Lebanese Club of Ottawa.

"Most of my family is in Lebanon. Some of them were affected directly, their windows were shattered and their kids hospitalized. The hospitals aren't even able to take in the insane amount of wounded people. It's horrible." Yes, it is horrible. A country in a financial crisis, desperately trying to deal with a pandemic, an unstable government, the major governing share of which is an actual terrorist group outlawed by Western society and some countries in the Middle East. Lebanon has become Hezbollah.

That is the kind of insane instability that millions of people are forced to live with. A country that imports 80 percent of its food from abroad, and when an entirely avoidable catastrophe occurred with an explosion at a warehouse holding ammonium nitrate, buildings were levelled, a hundred people died, thousands wounded, and a storage unit containing 85 percent of the nation's wheat was destroyed.

For us, life though complicated by the everpresent threat of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, goes on. Predictable, familiar, and comforting. We are faced with innumerable little challenges throughout the course of every day and transcend them. Never or rarely are we confronted by a multiplicity of life-threatening circumstances coming at us from all directions.

The direction we took this morning was to take our usual morning passage into routine, led by Jackie and Jillie, our two little companion dogs, making our way into the forest for a leisurely ramble through woodland trails. The rain so recently stopped that it was continually falling from the foliage surrounding us. Thimbleberries picked as per usual, to whet our puppies' appetite for their breakfast that would follow on our return back home.

The copious rain from the frequent, unrelenting rainstorms and thunderstorms have stimulated the growth of various fungi and moulds, appearing now with greater frequency on tree trunks and decomposing, fallen trunks littering the forest floor. Some are colourful, looking like discarded orange peel, others are strangely architectural and grow in colonies. And there are the other fungi that come up as perfect mushrooms, beautifully shaped and multi-coloured.

Everything green looked as though it had been freshly lacquered. The forest was dark and it was still, but for the beautiful melodic notes of a cardinal . Every leaf emphasized its presence, dark, bright green and slicked with rain. And to our surprise, we came across a red baneberry shrub with most of its ripe red berries intact; a rarity this year in the woods where usually there are so many.

We passed by a familiar figure walking his black Lab, a dog that we never, ever see without his favourite bright orange stick held firmly in his mouth, no matter how long they're out, how far they delve into the forest. And finally, we wound up our circuit for the morning and headed back to street level to make our way home to the bright colourful welcome of our garden. Safe. Secure.