Transformation in a Pandemic
“So what’s this thing about a virus?” I shrug as I sip my beer. It’s late February and I had a Saturday off to go up to see a friend. We’re sitting in a brewpub, side by side. People filter in and out. CNN blares in the background, but I let it fade into the background.
“Something in Wuhan. I give it two weeks and it will blow over. You know how these news cycles blow over,” he replies, his beard collecting some foam in his moustache.
“Yeah. Certainly nothing to worry about.” I say. God, I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Two weeks later. My phone rings. It’s mid-March.
My boss sounds panicked, worried, shaken.
“Bill?”
“Yeah?” I reply, thrown off kilter by his tone.
“I wanted to mentally prepare you for this Monday.”
“What do you mean?”
“The company has decided how they’re going to handle this virus situation.”
“Ok…?” I was working in a retail paint store. I knew they wouldn’t shut down like other companies and allow a work from home option. It wasn’t doable with our business model.
“They’re going to have us lock the doors and make the whole operation curbside.”
“Curbside? Like an Applebee’s?” I was trying to joke and make light of the situation, but it fell on deaf ears.
“Yeah. They want us to lock the doors and do business over the phone. When the order is complete, we call again and put it in their trunk or outside the door for them.”
“Are you kidding me?” So many questions. How would this work? Paint isn’t pizza. There are different brands. There are tons of supplies too like rollers, brushes, and trays. We were going to have to describe different ones over the phone and figure it out? And what about paint matches?
Tim understood my silence. “I don’t know how we’re going to do it either. That’s why I called. I wanted to make sure you knew before you came in on Monday. The change is going to be astronomically difficult and I know it will be hard for customers to adjust.”
“You got that right.”
It was hell. My boss to my left is wearing a mask, medical glasses and gloves. An outside sales rep to my right is pacing around dousing her hands every twenty seconds with more Purell. Phones ringing off the hook. People trying to describe what roller they wanted only to fail at doing so. Bringing paint to someone’s car and people following you around the lot because they wanted to talk to you in person. Every once in a while, you’d see someone banging on the door trying to get in.
I felt more anger and frustration directed at me than ever before.
I kept hearing how I was an “essential worker” and all I felt like was underappreciated.
I would come home to my girlfriend, working long hours for a non-profit who was telling her she wasn’t doing enough, despite 12 hr long shifts every day. It would be 8 or 9 o’clock before we spent time together.
Sarah had a preexisting medical condition asthma and at the time, and was understandably worried about making contact with others.
I would go to the grocery store by myself, gloves and a mask, running around trying to get things as fast as possible.
We would cook, we would sit, we would worry about the state of the world. A new article would say things were getting better. Ten articles would say things were getting worse. I felt rage building with the general public. The energy had shifted massively from what it was only a year ago.
My work opened up its doors again in June. On the first day, I had a rather large man come in. English was not his first language and he was struggling to order a gallon of paint.
“Sir, what did you order last? I can look it up for you?”
“Massimo! It’s under Massimo!”
He kept getting angrier and angrier as he said his last name. I couldn’t find it. There was no record.
“I’m sorry, sir. I don’t see it.”
The man exploded, pulling down his mask to yell at me. “Why can’t you find it? I shopped here yesterday!”
I stepped back to avoid his spittle. He took it as a sign of aggression and lunged forward. “I’ll make you cry, little boy. I’ll pound you until your face bleeds!”
My brain began thinking how I could best run away from this man. How I would exit the store and make a beeline for my car. How I would drive, and drive and drive, until I was far away from him.
My manager stepped in. “Sir. Here’s your paint. Please take it and leave. Don’t come back please.”
The man continued to point and yell, screaming, looking at me. I stared back blankly and dumbfounded, unable to reply. Tim continued, “Sir. Please. Leave.”
Finally realizing what was going on and that he was embarrassing himself, the man took his gallon and left. The rest of the day I was shaken. What was this world coming to?
I would return home late, staring at ceilings, drinking heavily, wondering when this would be over.
I fantasized about selling all my things, buying a van and traveling across the country.
I thought that would be better than coming in daily to deal with the retail hell.
But then I thought about all the money we would have to invest and how there was no end goal…and I would go back to work.
“They’re making me go out and do outreaches again.” Sarah said. She was in tears.
“Why? You have a pre-existing health condition.”
“They keep saying that I’ll get fired if I don’t go out.”
“You should talk to HR.”
“My boss is openly friends with HR, and I don’t think anything will come of it.”
Sarah and I got into arguments about this all the time, but it was hard to blame her. I was dealing with similar struggles in my own work.
Unfortunately, her work dealt with children. And although she was trying to create science experiments that would be COVID friendly, it is extremely difficult to do with children.
Sarah spent every outing worried about getting COVID, and then would come home to work what felt like hundreds of hours that they would take advantage of her for.
A couple of months later, I got a promotion. I became the manager of another store closer to my home.
Things became more difficult. Now I was a mask enforcer, a policeman telling those to put their masks on. Several contractors would fight with me or pull them down to their chin, saying they were still “wearing them.”
One day, I was helping an old woman buy paint. This was probably her only time out all week. She was shaking, trying to get through the interaction quickly.
Another man came into the building, not wearing a mask.
“Could you please put a mask on, sir?” I asked.
“No, I cannot. My lungs turn to ice if I wear it, my doctor has told me that I don’t have to wear it.”
“I’m sorry, sir, you will have to go outside and call us. We can handle your order curbside.”
A switch flipped and he went from 0 to 300% anger. “I don’t understand why I can’t just be in here like everyone else.”
The older woman moved farther from the man, almost cowering.
“Because these are the rules. We need you to get out of the building.” I said.
The man and I stared at each other for a good twenty seconds before he said, “Never mind, I’ll go somewhere else.” He stormed out of the building.
“I’m sorry,” I said as I looked at the older woman. She sighed and nodded. “I understand. It’s not your fault.”
But it felt like it was. There was an interaction like this every day. And as the pandemic dragged on it only became more and more painful.
“I think I should quit.” Sarah told me.
“I think you should too.”
Sarah had been looking for other jobs for a while now. But how much time could she actually spend finding one? Most of her time was devoted to the job she was currently at. And it seemed to be taking more and more of her life.
“I’m going to. It might be hard for a while, but we’ll figure it out.”
“I’d rather you be happy.”
Sarah set a quit date for herself at the beginning of the next year. In January, she would be done.
“Bill, I have it.” My brother said, “I went in to work and I poured myself a coffee and I couldn’t taste it. I stuck my nose so far into the cup that I almost drowned myself.”
“Oh my god, Ben, I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do?”
“Nah, mom and dad are coming up to drop off a survival pack.” He laughed. “But I should be good.”
“Well, keep in touch. You’re young, so I’m sure you’ll be ok.”
“Yeah…”
But he wouldn’t be. After he recovered, his taste would never be the same. Ben could no longer eat meat, eggs, or drink coffee. He essentially became vegan, and not by choice. He was one of the sufferers of long Covid. He would constantly have to tell family and friends that he was vegan, but not for environmental reasons.
When he would say this to people, they would look at him like he was on drugs. I would also try to explain it, and no one would get it.
It wasn’t until months later when others came out talking about it, he felt validated, but even then, it was another way the pandemic divided us all.
Sarah and I are sitting at a brunch place we like, enjoying the summer weather. The pandemic wave had hit a lull and outdoor seating was the common thing. We had our two doses of the vaccine and felt like we were more able to enjoy life. It had been a couple months since she quit her job and she hadn’t found any good job prospects. They were all still in her non-profit field, where there is a strong pressure to take advantage of employees. Sarah had had it. She recently went in for a library interview, and had the same problems she had at the other places she had worked. They even asked her to work “on the job” to prove she could work there.
“Bill, I think I want to be a writer.”
“Then do it, Sarah. I’ll support you.”
“It may be a while before I make enough.”
“I’d rather you do something you’re happy about.”
We both smiled. It may be a harder road at the onset, but things were changing for the better.
An email hit our inboxes with a splash. “Everyone can choose whether they want to wear their masks or not. It is up to the individual what they want to do.”
The feeling of being able to breathe at work and not have to enforce masks for the first time was incredible. For the first time since early 2020, this felt like the job I had signed up for. Things were good for a couple months, until Omicron hit. Another email came out that told us we had to wear our masks, but the customers could choose not to.
It felt like the worst of all possible situations. Here now, we had to be safe, but the customers didn’t? We didn’t have to enforce anything, but now we had to explain to people that we had to wear it?
I tried not to go into detail with explanations. It was easier that way.
It was easier than explaining that my corporation couldn’t make up its mind. That it couldn’t decide if it was protecting us or political values.
A couple more months went by and the mask ban was finally lifted in early 2022. Things weren’t one hundred percent better, but I felt like my job was back to the way it should be.
But I had seen something that made me change my opinion on my work.
I had seen a corporation show how much it cared about its workers. And that small level of care wasn’t enough for me. For another year, I contemplated how I would move on. How I would leave and start my own business and embrace who I wanted to be.
Having the amount of restriction I had in my life made me realize what was important to me. How I wanted to connect instead of being divided. How I wanted to see people in person instead of over zoom chats. How humans are meant to connect. To bring together their differences. To challenge each other. To stand in their truth.
Sometimes the greatest struggles breed the greatest transformations.
For Sarah and I, it was our jobs. For Ben, it was his diet.
What was it for you?
Hey, I’m Bill. I talk about spirituality, self-help, advice, and music. Give me a follow if you like my vibe.
