We’re Making Masks for Doctors We Can’t Afford To Visit

Since March 19th, I have been sewing masks. Masks for doctors, nurses, friends, and family. Masks for people who live or work in nursing homes. My phone vibrates with an 800 number. A collection agency from a medical bill I haven’t paid from last year. I decline the call.

For me and millions of other Americans, the cost of health insurance is insurmountable. I am a freelance Costume Designer and if I don’t get my union days in any given quarter, I don’t get to have health insurance. This hard truth is just one of many dark thoughts I face as this global pandemic looms. I keep sewing.

Why does someone like me even have to make these masks? I technically don’t, but someone does. There are not enough masks for medical staff on the front lines. Doctors and nurses are fashioning protective gear out of trash bags. How can I just sit there when I have skills that could possibly help? I’m not doing this because I want any accolades. I’m doing this because if the doctors and nurses go down, we are fucked. America is fucked.

I take donations and send them to other people in town; people who also cannot afford to go to the doctor. Then I send elastic to Kentucky and Virginia. I send cash to a seamstress in Georgia who is also unemployed and has already spent $200 of her own money on mask supplies. She has…