COVID Journal
7/30/Almost August
We never thought it would last this long, or maybe that was just me. I was resolving warm weather would cure this mess like it cures most melancholy. I stepped outside just now to write in the warm breeze only to hear the snap of my neighbor’s lighter putting flame to a bong that even he can’t stand the stench or draw of as he takes to his porch coughing on his own remedy.
I digress.
I turn back inside.
I close the door a little too loudly.
When this sci-fi indy named COVID featured as reality, I believed we would all come together. I realized only today in what way I was mistaken. I and you and you and you have never lived through a pandemic. In fact, I am not entirely certain that I will. I took the closest social experiences I could compare and assumed we would reach out our hands, swell our hearts and bond from the tragedy which attacked our family, our health, our trust and our livelihood. The difference is that tragedies have victims and survivors. We have not survived. There was no moment or time and place that we managed to avoid; no people we can set apart to feel sorry for.
We have not survived.
I am a potential victim.
I see you as an unknown/silent enemy.
Instead of our hearts going out, our shields go up. We grasp any issue we can leverage to define an “us” and a “them.” We put a face to an enemy and name them as such. In this way, we attempt to exert power from our position of powerlessness.
Instead of offering a greeting, or better, a genuine interest in how our neighbor is doing while clearly living on his own and presumably newly jobless, we turn our back and close the door too loudly.
Maybe we are all guilty.
Maybe we are all afraid.
Maybe we are our own enemy.
Maybe we can fix that.
