It’s getting worse?
Yes it is, and it’s apparently 69 days until we’re going to get any presidential leadership on it. Coronavirus infection rates, hospitalization rates and deaths are climbing and climbing fast.
All this after our president said the media was just talking about Covid-19 to hurt his campaign and that once the election was past, we would never hear about it again.
Ah, if only.
In the nine days since the election, the only things Donald Trump has done that didn’t have to do with complaining about the results were visit Arlington National Cemetery on Veterans Day and fire the Secretary of Defense. Trump has never particularly cared about the nuts and bolts of running the government, but this is ridiculous.
This isn’t about him, though.
It isn’t even about politics.
I’m wondering how we get to a point where we can resume some semblance of normal life. My wife hasn’t been out of the house for anything other than doctor’s appointments since February. My own trips out haven’t been for anything that wasn’t neccesary in all that time.
No movies, although I’ve probably been to a thousand movies or more in my lifetime.
No ballgames, although I’ve seen hundreds and hundreds of ballgames.
It isn’t about me either.
Even if we lose all this year and next year, that would amount to less than 3 percent of my life to date. But to my youngest granddaughter Albanie, losing out on 2020 and 2021 would amount to nearly 30 percent of hers.
It’s difficult. My daughter and her family completed four years in Guatemala this summer and next summer they will go to Tunisia for three years. That’s the life of a Foreign Service family. They’re in Virginia right now, and Pauline and her colleague/husband Johnathan are learning Arabic.
The shame of it is that the children essentially have one year out of eight in the U.S., and they are spending it in lockdown. But God willing and the creek don’t rise, all six of them will have perfectly normal lives for the rest of the 21st century.
And they’ll have some great stories to tell their own children and grandchildren.
But are we even sure we will be past all this by the end of 2021? We’re hearing good things about vaccines, but we don’t even know if they will provide long-term immunity. Some vaccines for other diseases project people for years if not a lifetime. Some diseases have been eradicated, but they’re not viruses.
Viruses are much more difficult to stop. If you get measles as a kid, you’ll never get it again. But if you get the flu once, you can get it again … and again … and again. That’s why doctors tell us we should get flu shots every year.
So how do we get to the point where we can live normal lives again?
Maybe we need to come up with a new normal.
Maybe masks will have to become a semi-permanent part of our wardrobe. Maybe social distancing as often as possible will be a sensible thing to continue doing. Just behaving sensibly toward others, and getting the vaccine each year to protect you for the winter.
First we’ve got to get through the next 69 days and get to a president who’ll actually concentrate on beating the virus instead of making political points.
Sorry.
I guess it was a little political after all.