Corona Conned… er, Crowned
It’s odd. It’s the modern equivalent of quarantine.
Of the four of us home (one is assisting grandma and a bit stranded — happily, but stranded none the less), three are essential under the newest counter-intuitive definition of essential. One of those has used a health issue to get sent home (that one has only been home for 48 hours, and might not last another 48 — I did not think marriage was a 24-hour, 7-days-a-week deal in terms of physical proximity).
I’m seeing lots of little life lessons. Maybe I should share them (or maybe I should just crawl back under a comforter and binge watch documentaries until my dream job becomes essential again).
Lesson 1: Prepare well always
Most of us who are sane always keep supplies on hand. We don’t keep large quantities of anything.
We should.
The ill prepared and insane anxiety mongers have bought up toilet paper and cleaning supplies. As those shelves remained empty, they started buying other things (canned goods and dry goods that should last forever).
As we the sane and well prepared run out, we cannot purchase those things. So we have to improvise or do without (I hear stale tortillas can double as TP and are biodegradable as well).
We who prepare well were ill prepared to deal with the ill prepared.
Lesson 2: Ask the hard questions
We have to be ready to ask tough, challenging questions.
We sit awestruck at the phrasings proceeding from our leaders’ mouths: unprecedented, deadly, doing the right things for all of society.
But we don’t ask them the right questions, and if our journalists aren’t fear mongering, they’re asking questions that the leaders have an artful dodge for:
- What is the real mortality rate?
- Do we really know how this is transmitted?
- Why are we now voluntarily wearing masks? Especially since only special masks really filter out the tiny virus particles? (However, since there was a shooting over a sneeze perceived as not properly covered, I will choose to hide behind a makeshift mask.)
- You said A. Now you’re saying B. This seems quite contradictory. Can you explain?
- What’s the real deal? Where’s the sleight of hand? What’s the issue you’re trying to hide from the globe?
Lesson 3: Have a blue-collar or low-skilled backup
While most of my friends in teaching, IT, and consulting are either not working or struggling to work from home, others chug along at next to nothing.
Fast food workers continue to operate drive-thrus.
Waitstaff prepare take out orders.
General laborers keep the hardware stores open (where the old people foolishly focus on gardening supplies).
Home health aides continue to scrub toilets and wipe bottoms.
Truck drivers struggle to keep up with the anxiety-triggered hoarding tendencies of a spoiled American populace.
I hear plumbers and electricians are still available to handle emergency situations that develop in their home.
Based on this, I believe everyone with a degree ought to have to learn a trade. They should learn this trade in high school and then use it to get through college instead of riding on massive debt.
Life Lesson 4: Survive
As people get additional fines for not tolerating quarantine well, as suicides increase, as homicides grow, we have the directive humans have had for centuries:
SURVIVE
How do we do that? How can we in a troublesome and toxic situation stay alive and thrive?
The most important thing is to breathe deeply. Rest when you can. Realize that we are blessed and spoiled and doing without wants that we used to call needs won’t hurt us.
But more than that, check on others while using appropriate social distancing. Throw on a mask and check on that old widow with the beautiful garden on the corner. Leave a roll of TP in the sun for the widower. Grab a gallon of milk for the working single mom and wipe it down with disinfectant as you deliver it.
While we are waiting to return to business as usual, let’s challenge the old status quo. Let’s look at what is really essential (every re-appropriation intended). Let’s choose lower debt, fewer hours of work, and more time outdoors exercising and relaxing. Let’s trade standardized testing based on facts that may or may not relate for asking real world questions and finding solutions or answers with skills for evaluating the value of information.
Let’s redefine life to have a foundation built on intangible values that build an encouraging environment where all can survive and thrive.
