Immunity

Three and a half weeks ago I had my first Covid vaccine shot. I felt relived and surprised about feeling relieved. 

I took the opportunity to shop—living in a remote area pre-made pizza is a serious luxury! I remember being up, super positive and encouraged as the days were getting rapidly longer, weather warming here in the far northern hemisphere and hints of green buds appearing.

It is an hour and a half mountainous drive back. Entering the house I stumbled. That’s remarkable—I am used to exceptionally good balance as a skier and climber. Being unsteady with shopping in my hands is weird. 

It got stranger 

By the next day I am short of breath and definitely noticing my well out of kilter balance—as I’m walking back down a hill I am worrying about faceplanting! By the evening I am fatigued, feeling chilled or feverish in rotating cycles, sore stomach and head with an almost continuous adrenalin-endorphin like rush coursing through my skin.

I look up the covid vaccine side effects.

In many ways the vaccine side effects are a straightforward list. They are clearer than worldwide side effects—our activities such as fossil fuel consumption driving are planetary biodiversity loss, colonialism underlying an intergenerational, wildly inequitable wealth distribution. These are our meta-crises.

The analogy to my side-effects is apt. We did not set out to create these crises. Mostly we were, and are, seeking solutions.

Crises feed each other

The loss of biodiversity, for example, has quite a direct link with the likelihood of future covid like pandemics—see Pivotal moment here> Similarly, our burning of fossil fuel is obviously warming the planet and creating feedback, more severe and dangerous weather patterns, floods, fires alongside much more that. More significant worldwide calamities and extinctions are on the way.

Cross-meta-crises links might be less obvious, e.g. between our current pandemic and colonialism plus wealth disparity. Yet, this is very present. For example people in richer countries eat more meat, we produce significant quantities of this in factory farms where animals are fed grain rather than grazing on grass. That grain is grown on arable land which in turn pushes less profitable farming into more and more marginal land, to de-forest land and degrade river systems. Links from that include: more meat, less forest, less greenhouse gas absorption, a warmer planet.  

There are many other connections yet, in simple terms, the world has a fever. When we have a fever it is usually our body fighting an infection. A virus is multiplying inside us and our body is fighting to regain health. However, if the fever is too extreme, it can damage our brains and it can kill us. 

Day 5

After the vaccine, I definitely felt feverish.

Cycling through fever feelings, for 20 minutes, and then onto the same periods of chills and dizziness, I headed to the floor. I was thinking: ok, this is quite intense and definitely more than 48 hours. I’ll just sit here while it passes.

It became stronger. 

I lay on the floor and flipped off somewhere else—a vivid experience, dream state, where I am in some wonderful and deep conversations with a group of people. Except, of course, I am alone. Coming back to my room I stay put a while longer. A little more time on the floor, I think. This will pass. 

A short time later I look at my watch. It is 5 pm. I have been there for nearly seven hours. However, I am still thinking this will pass within days. I am certainly not thinking it will take weeks or months.

Time-folding

There is a time slip too with our lives and our planet. For example, the greenhouse gases we emit today will impact for decades and centuries to come. This is from you-I-all of us through direct and indirect impacts such as from the foods we eat and clothing we buy and wear. 

If, magically, we are to stop all such human driven extra carbon dioxide (and other gases) going into the atmosphere what’s already emitted will continue to warm the planet. 

Our planet’s fever is not simply cured. Just as heading to the floor was not a simple relief for my fever.

Restoration and justice 

Similarly, colonisation and its impacts endure. This did not end as the sun set on Britain’s empire. Nor did it end with the American Civil War and slavery being banned. Our minds and thinking patterns, our ways of being—prejudices as well as intra-people-culture care, compassion and connection—are deeply ingrained from such experiences. Much of these impacts did not start with us. Our forbears lives—and the pain, struggle and beauty from those times—remain influential today.

We see this today. As I’m writing this ex-policeman Derek Chauvin is found guilty for murdering George Floyd. While this is welcome and overdue it is not a simple fix. Minnesota’s attorney general, Keith Ellison makes the point:

I would not call today’s verdict “justice”, however, because justice implies true restoration. But it is accountability, which is the first step towards justice.

A four part story

Part two> is Visions beyond crisis. That title is inspired by my (short lived) relief on day 8, Saturday  and Vandana Shiva’s essay Planting the seeds of the future.

Read on here>

COVID-19 has made people in India wake up to the links between food and health. Everyone was waiting for the vaccine. But it turned out that the people who did not get COVID-19 were the ones with high immunity. And who were they? The ones who weren’t eating junk food. They were eating indigenous diets: lots of turmeric, a lot of ginger, a lot of ashwagandha. As a result, there’s been a waking up to the sophistication of the Indian diet. This is in line with Ayurveda philosophy and its foundational idea about diet, which is just as Hippocrates recognized: let food be thy medicine. Ayurveda says, “Annam Sarvaushadhi.” Food is the best medicine.
Vandana Shiva