by Edward Shanahan.

The Unexplained World podcast is back with Chicago Psychic Medium Edward Shanahan and Pagan Truth Seeker Annette.

Annette and I are starting our 11th year of podcasting The Unexplained World podcast and could make us one of the oldest running podcasts in this field.

Starting this year, we have a new podcast host, Anchor.fm  It is different than the last host, and I am getting used to the workings of the new hosting service. We could not wait any longer, so we have jumped in, and some learning will be by doing.

The New Shows can be heard at the locations listed below. Also, remember to please subscribe, and like The Unexplained World podcast at the website you will be listening to it.

You can find the website for The Unexplained World podcast on Anchor.fm  at; The Unexplained World podcast.

Google Podcasts –  podcast link.
Anchor.fm  – podcast link.
Spotify  – podcast link.
Breaker – podcast link.
Radio Public – podcast link.
Pocket Casts – podcast link.
OverCasts – podcast link.
Apple Podcasts – coming soon.

The Unexplained World podcast just published has:
Annette – my Co-Host on The Unexplained World, talking about ‘This Moment in Time’.
Jim Blaze – Chicago Pro Wrestler traveling the country and trainer for POWW pro wrestling. Jim joins me with making predictions about the matches at this year’s WrestleMania.
Edward Shanahan – His end of the show commentary being:  Internal Spiritual Knowledge.

Enjoy The Unexplained World podcast, and remember to subscribe at your place of listening so you are updated on each new podcast.

Blessings and Prayers to all,
Edward Shanahan

Visit Edward Shanahan’s  Psychic Medium website and awarded Best Chicago Psychic at: Edward Shanahan’s website.
Private Readings, House Party/Gatherings, Spirit Communications information at the website.

The Unexplained World podcast – The Unexplained World Internet Broadcast Website,
On Twitter – includes a daily Spiritual / Paranormal Newspaper.
Edward Shanahan on Facebook – Facebook Page .
The two books by Edward Shanahan. The Kindle Version

(c) 2020 Edward Shanahan

ENGLISH:
As announced by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, the Department of Housing is giving a limited number of $1,000 grants to low-income households having financial hardship as a result of the COVID-19 Stay at Home Order. It takes 10 minutes to submit the online form. However, upon request, applicants must be able to show documentation demonstrating loss of work or the negative financial impact of coronavirus in their livelihoods.

For more public relief during this pandemic, Chicagoans have to pressure the mayor, Governor Pritzker, their aldermen and state representatives.

ESPAÑOL:
Como lo anunció la alcaldeza Lori Lightfoot, el Departamento de Vivienda repartirá un número limitado de becas de $1,000, por medio de una lotería, a los hogares que han sido impactados negativamente por la cuarentena del COVID-19. Sólo se toma 10 minutos llenar la forma (en inglés o español) y la aplicación no pregunta el estatus migratorio. Más adelante, los finalistas tendrían que comprobar la pérdida de días/horas de trabajo con talones de cheque, declaración bancaria, o una carta del empleador.

Para más asistencia pública durante la pandemia, los residentes de Chicago deberán presionar a la alcaldeza, el gobernador Pritzker, sus concejales y representantes estatales.

COOKING WHILE ISOLATED

And if you want an interesting story don’t expect it all to be true.

So I’m standing in front of my stove cooking vegetables with beans. Well, to be honest, and as I said I don’t like to go that way too much, but to be honest, it was shredded carrots and Bush’s Baked Beans cuz they have more flavor. I know one can take dried beans and soak them for like 2 or 3 weeks, I am not sure how long, but that is supposed to get the farts out of them. But that sounds really intimidating so I generally do something really technical like getting a can opener and opening a can of beans. They are vegetables, no meat, lots of protein, I think, and combine them with, maybe shredded carrots, and, let’s see, I think I have also used, well, shredded celery, yeah, and I can’t remember what else. So also, I love rice. I used to mainly cook and eat rice and chicken, but I know some people, well, this one friend of mine, not my girlfriend, but friend friend, whatever, anyway, nice lady and she is a vegetarian. When I was a kid I would get that mixed up with veterinarian. So I loved animals, still do, but when I found out I was trying to become a vegetarian I freaked out and went into another profession. So, trying to eat more vegetables, besides my Internist, who is a cool guy, always tells me eat more vegetables, I need fiber, and exercise to get rid of my gut. Well, that is not going so well, but nobody is perfect, right? So, ok, then I cook rice, usually brown rice, which I like and is supposed to be healthy, and then I throw the rice in with the beans and shredded carrots and anything else which I think might be healthy. It tastes pretty good, I just want to tell you, really not bad at all. I use some spices too, in case you were wondering.

So, as I said, I’m standing at the stove and there is a knock on my door. Now, I live in an apartment complex, nice place, in a suburb of Chicago with nice trees and birds, squirrels, raccoons and such and I like it a lot. I live on the ground floor and look out of my balcony onto the parking lot, trees, etc. Nice. Oh, yeah, a small river. That all has nothing to do with my story. Anyway, no one knocks on my door. Like, I don’t get visitors. Twice someone knocked on my door and one time someone was complaining that my dog was barking. I explained the situation to that person, like, we can go to court if you want, so they left me alone. Another time a young lady, who it turned out was from Sweden, and I apologized if my dog was barking or if my music was too loud but it was neither. She was just doing a Super Bowl thing where you bet on certain spaces on a form, whatever, I did not get it but she said she was raising money to help her mother in Sweden with some illness. Well, she was cute so I didn’t care so much about her mother or the Super Bowl, I just gave her some money. Whatever, you know?

Well, this time, a knock on the door. I turn down the heat so my beans and carrots don’t overheat. A guy is standing there, wearing one of these complicated masks, like N95 or G95, or some letter. I think N95. Keeps droplets and viruses away from your face. Good idea I guess. So he asks me if I have a spare N95 mask. So, like, I do not remember ever seeing this guy before, although I kind of keep to myself. I see people around the complex and I say hi! Or stay well, or have a nice day. You know how it is. These days we try to be extra good to our neighbors. I’m dyin’ and one of my neighbors calls 911, so it is all good. Anyway, I said no, sorry, do not have a mask. I do have something from last Halloween but no mask. At this point I am not sure if this guy is for real or he really has a problem. So, anyway he says his girlfriend is coming over and she does not have a mask and he promised her he would get her one but he has not succeeded so far. They are hard to get it seems. Well I am thinkin’ hard because he seems like a nice dude and I do not want his evening with his girlfriend to be messed up, although, in the back of my mind I am kind of picturing the two of them tryin’ to make out wearing masks. So, then I remembered something I saw on the Internet. Listen I tell him, I saw this on the Internet. It’s perfect. You take a lady’s bra, cut it in half and on each cup you fasten the elastic to go around your ears, and presto! You have a mask! And I told him, in addition, if you use her bra to make the mask, she’s not wearing a bra! Kill two birds with one stone! Well, he gave me this look, like, no, that is not going to work. So, me, thinking hard, “wait! I have another idea!” I go into my cupboard where I keep cans of beans, etc. Meanwhile he is standing in the doorway and my dog is giving him this low growl. So he is trying to not get bit and says stuff like “Good dog, nice boy” and of course she is a girl dog. Anyway, I come out with a coffee filter. Kind of cone-shaped. I tell him you just fasten elastic from, well, whatever, or maybe shoelaces to it, and presto! You have a mask! He kind of thinks this might work more than the bra cup. I can understand that. I have actually thought about this, because, like, I do not have a mask. And I do not have a female friend who I could ask for her bra for a mask.

And then I pictured this: I go to a lingerie store and buy a bra to make a mask. First, I have to endure the saleslady giving me this look, like “yeah, sure.” Also, what kind. I am thinking pink or lavender. But if I buy one with a little lace on top,… I like those, and I make my mask, and then I go to the grocery store and I have a pink or lavender bra cup on my face, and I am standing in line. So I am standing on my X, keeping my distance, and there is a couple in the line next to me, I am staring at the floor, staring at my X. I look up, kind of glance over at the guy and he is staring at me but looks away. Then he kind of looks at his wife or girlfriend and she takes a quick glance at me and giggles. Yeah, no, I am NOT doing that!

So, I give the guy a coffee filter. Actually 2, in case he messes one up. I say, sorry, I don’t have any spare shoe laces. He says no problem, this should work. I go back to cooking. I add the rice into the beans and shredded carrots. I add some barbecue sauce for flavor. This should be good. Spooning it into my dish I pour myself a glass of wine. I am looking forward to dinner. These days, there is not always a lot more. Then, I guess the young lady arrived. I thought I heard a knock across the hallway, a door opening. Then, “Oh my God, are you kidding me! You want me to wear a coffee filter on my face?!! “ Then a sort of muffled, “Well, I have another idea.” I poured another glass of wine.

March 31, 2020

Wringer Washer Machine                                            (www.automaticwasher.org)

While I grew up my grandmother Hannah Baker Tarrant took care of me. She lived in Trumbull Gardens, a housing project on the Southeast side of Chicago. I spent my first five years there with her (during the late ’60s and early ’70s.) On certain designated days, she would do her laundry in the basement of the apartment complex that she lived in. On her designated day she was able to use a fenced lawn in the projects to hang out her clothes. If the weather was too bad she could use a sectioned off room in the basement which had clothing lines.

She would tell me how much she liked her wringer washer machine. She thought of it as such a luxury. I was always fascinated by it. After the clothes went through a spin cycle she would have to grab each piece and put it through the “wringer”, which would squeeze out all the water. Then she would drain the soapy water from the basin of the machine and let it fill up with clean water. This was the rinse cycle. We would repeat the wringing one more time. She never let me wring them; she said my fingers would get smashed.

During these times she would tell me all about Ireland. She grew up in Dingle until she came to the United States as a young 18-year-old girl. In Ireland, they did not have things like the wringer machine. She told me about how hard things were then. Maybe because I myself was very little, it never occurred to me that anything she said could be possible. Her stories were just that, a story. Like a fairytale. One story that just recently came to mind and literally woke me from my sleep was the story about how her siblings started dying, one by one.

My grandma told about a time when she was my age that she would go to bed at night and wake up the next morning to find one of her brothers dead, sleeping next to her. I could not wrap my head around this then, but I had to look into it now as we are sheltered in place during the Coronavirus pandemic. After verifying with my Aunt Mag that this was a true memory (my grandmother passed away in 1998), I decided to look into my grandmother’s story a little deeper.

Around 1916 in Ireland, most families lost children to infectious diseases such as whooping cough, scarlet fever, Diptheria, and the disease which took my grandmother’s siblings, tuberculosis (TB.)

One-eighth of the population in Ireland died from TB, which at that time was 6,471. Another 6,708 died from pneumonia and bronchitis. TB, like many other viruses, was transmitted by respiratory droplets. I learned that men were more at risk of contracting and dying from TB than women, which explained why my grandmother lost all of her brothers.

My grandmother told me that when a sibling would pass away, her mother would cry a distinctive cry. One day when my grandmother was walking home from school, she could hear her mother cry. She said to me, “I recognize that cry and ran off. I knew another one had died.”

I think her story runs so powerfully in my mind now, while I am working from home during this pandemic of Coronavirus. I think of what my Great-grandmother went through back in Ireland in the early 1900s, burying child after child. I think of how my grandmother felt, wondering each night who would be next.

With each pandemic, it seems the world has learned valuable lessons. Prior to the TB episode was the Diptheria pandemic. Diptheria comes from the Greek word for “leather” which described the way the throat looked inside when a person had it. It was during this pandemic that a doctor performed the first tracheotomy. This involved cutting open the trachea and inserting a tube the opening to allow air and cleaning out of the lungs. This is what we now call “intubation”, and is done when a patient is put on a ventilator.

An antitoxin was developed for Diptheria and was able to save many children. An Alaskan doctor, during the height of Diptheria, had ordered the medicine for his town of Nome, Alaska in 1924. A hospital in Anchorage had 300,000 units of it but could only deliver it to a city that was 674 miles away from Nome. Twenty mushers with dogs and sleds braved sub-zero weather, with several dying or getting frostbit to make the rest of the journey. The physician was able to save the children in his town. This journey was called the Great Race of Mercy.

The Great Race of Mercy antitoxin delivery for Diptheria (1924)

Before Diptheria, there were other pandemics in history that I barely remember learning much about. The “black death” was also known as the bubonic plague. During 1347 and 1350, this disease killed 30% of all of Europe.

The 1918 flu was one of the worst diseases in history, accounting for more than one-third of the world’s population in loss of life (approximately 50,000 million people at that time.) Through this outbreak, the importance of sheltering in place became a concept. Cities who strictly adhered to social distancing saw far less mortality. The city of Philadelphia disregarded the warning to shelter in place and threw a parade to celebrate the World War I effort, with over 200,000 people attending the parade. By the end of the week, over 4,500 people died from the flu. The neighboring city of St. Louis, which did not participate and instead shut down its public transit and city, suffered half of the loss of Philadelphia. Children would wear little satchel bags of camphor around their necks to prevent the spread of the disease. For them, camphor was the 1900s version of hand sanitizer.

During the Spanish Flu of 1918-19, children wore small satchels around their necks filled with camphor.

Novel coronaviruses such as SARS, Ebola, and Zika have a high mutation rate. A new study suggests that for every confirmed case of coronavirus, there are likely 5-10 more people who also have it undetected. Just this week our U.S. Government experts have warned that perhaps 100,000 people could perish from the coronavirus disease. The importance of social distancing, a method that was emphasized during the Spanish flu in the early 1900s, stands true today. We are converting McCormick Place into a makeshift hospital, similar to the time of the Spanish flu when schools and other buildings became makeshift hospitals, and medical students had to take the place of doctors.

It is believed that the bats are to blame for the spread of the Coronavirus. The Cholera pandemic of the 1800s is believed to have been spread by a contaminated water pump handle which now sits in a museum in London. The flu pandemics are believed to have originated from avian flu that came from Hong Kong and China.

Social distancing, cleanliness such as washing your hands, and sheltering in place are critical during this time as it was during the time of other pandemic diseases in history. Unlike my grandmother and great-grandmother from Ireland, we have so much more on our side through social media, our news and information that we can access at any given time, our incredible medical facilities and doctors, nurses, first responders, and labs. I would never have guessed that I would ever witness a pandemic in my lifetime. My family is safe, unlike my great-grandmother’s experience of burying more than half of her children. We may have moved so much further from the days of the wringer washer machine. Yet we have to learn to respect the lessons from those days and the stories shared with us by our ancestors. We must pay great tribute to their hard-fought battles during times of disease and pandemics, lest we blindly suffer such tragedy again.

My grandmother Hannah Baker-Tarrant (right) with her sister Kathleen (1926) Chicago, IL

My daughter spent the past couple of weeks at our house, but she headed back to her home for the rest of the shelter in place today. For the few days she was with us, which seemed like months when we lived through them, it felt like we were safe as a family. There were walks with the dog, cooking, a trip to the grocery store, shared viewing of old “House” episodes, and a shared anxiety.

We worked through the stages of grief together—denial, anger, depression, bargaining, and acceptance. I’m sure we’ll cycle through them again and again. But our first group landing on acceptance meant a huge grocery shopping trip and packing her up to go home.

We realized, without really saying so, that this is the way life is going to be for awhile and we best get on with living. She has lost her job for now, but she still has her apartment and her intense home workout schedule, her roommates, and all of the rest of life’s business.

My husband and I have become online teachers, and we are grateful to have our jobs, our students, and our communities.

I was teaching via Zoom when she left, and for that I am grateful. I’m sure I would have cried had I watched her car leave the driveway. My world is tucked in her grocery bags, among the oranges and carrots. I cannot bear thinking about this invisible beast of a virus licking and spitting her direction. Foolishly I imagine I can protect her if she’s home.

The house is so quiet now. Not as quiet as walks in the neighborhood, where I feel like a character in Stephen King’s “The Stand,” but quiet. It is a relatively peaceful quiet for now. It is punctuated by my dog barking at other dogs and my husband playing drums in the late afternoon.

I’m trying to get on with my life in ways that work for me. It’s a steep learning curve.

I’ve arranged a socially distanced walk with a friend for Wednesday, several Zoom sessions with students and colleagues, and have a to do list I’ll never ever finish. I feel like I’m walking in slow motion most of the time. I can’t get things done. My concentration is splotchy. My emotions are mostly suppressed.

During my Zoom session with students today, they asked if we’d be meeting like this weekly. I told them that most of our work would be asynchronous. I confessed that I scheduled the meeting today mostly because I needed to see that they were ok.

What I saw was people like me, struggling with anxiety and depression, fear, exhaustion, hope. They want to do school work, to write, but they want to go to their jobs and get paid and to feed their families even more. They have children to care for, life to cope with.

Sometimes it feels like moving to online courses is hardest for faculty, but I think the students struggle just as much or more. We are, at least, in control. They are at the mercy of our skill or lack of skill and of our mercy or lack of it. Suffice it to say that mercy is more scarce than I would have hoped.

My writing in this post is much like my brain’s functioning at the moment. I start down one path and then end up somewhere else.

I suppose what I’m saying is that I’m trying very hard to pivot. To learn how to find the closeness and contact with human beings that is so natural face to face, inches or a foot apart. I’m trying to learn how to be a teacher and a mother when neither students nor daughter are nearby.

Landing here on acceptance of life in a pandemic means becoming a new sort of person and contributing to a new sort of community.

Here’s hoping that you are finding the peace and connection that you need and that you are, most importantly, healthy.

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Easier said than done, I’m afraid.

Oh, Jeez – where to begin? (And please bear in mind, I’m not making light here – this is the single, most dire health event most of us have experienced in our lifetime, unless you were around for the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic.)

So here’s what I can’t handle about the nasty, one-celled little fucker that’s up-ended the entire world:

It’s a nasty, one-celled little fucker that’s up-ended the entire world.

And you thought global terrorism was bad?  Compared to this thing, ISIS, the Taliban and Al Qaeda were a petty inconveniences. Welcome to true germ warfare, my babies.  All I can think about is a one-celled organism with my name on it, on the surface of something I forgot to decontaminate before I touched it.

I can no longer touch my face or, God forbid, chew my pens.

Both bad habits of mine. I had no idea how many times I touched my face on a daily basis until Corona-scourge appeared.  You probably didn’t, either.

Lots of people are dying and more will die.

And I pray to holy God it isn’t you, me or anyone that we know and love. This is the one that keeps me up at night – like tonight – it’s 4:23 AM as I write this. Just a little abject fear of dying.

I have to keep working. I’m the new pariah.

I’m not gonna get into specifics here, but I have a job that I can’t phone in, and we are not closed for the duration.  Virtually my entire neighborhood is home, so every day when I leave for work, I feel like a criminal, or that I’m crossing a picket line.  I fully expect to find “SCAB” spray-painted on my car one morning. I want to stay home.  I’m supposed to stay home.  But I can’t. And there are thousands more just like me. Unless and until martial law is declared, we working pariahs are bearing a ton of guilt, along with a ton of fear. And it sucks.

I hate that our first responders and medical professionals are so incredibly put-upon and in constant danger.

Like their jobs weren’t difficult enough.  We all need to thank God every day that we have selfless professionals like this in our midst, much of the time working ill-equipped and against incomprehensible odds. Absolute heroes.

This damn thing is open-ended – no closure in sight.

This, I think, is the real crux here.  We don’t know when it will peak, level off, if having it gives one immunity for a second-strike, and if there will BE a second-strike.  Or a vaccine, treatment or cure.  Present AND future fear. Really hard to handle such long-term peril.

I can’t get a grip on my fear.

I keep thinking that this is the closest we will come to understanding how the country felt the day in 1941 that Pearl Harbor was bombed. Confused. Not comprehending. Frightened. Uncertain. And looking to State and Federal governments that are feeling the exact same way, yet still have to act.

Over the weekend, I re-read President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous speech from the day after Pearl was hit – the “Day Which Will Live In Infamy” speech.

In it, there are parallels to our coronavirus fight that I found interesting:

“… The facts of yesterday and today speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our nation.
As Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense. But always will our whole nation remember the character of the onslaught against us.
No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.
I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost, but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.
Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger.
With confidence in our armed forces, with the unbounding determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph—so help us God.”

From Roosevelt’s mouth to God’s ear. (Would that he were with us now!) I can well-understand why Americans danced in the streets on VE and VJ Days.

So take every precaution, my babies. Pray hard and continue taking care of one another. Don’t give up.

And may we one day soon be doing our own victory dance in the streets.

Thanks for reading.  Comments to:  [email protected]