“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”
― Fred Rogers
“A Journal of the Plague Year,” Daniel Defoe reports, “This was a time when every one’s private safety lay so near them they had no room to pity the distresses of others. … The danger of immediate death to ourselves, took away all bonds of love, all concern for one another.”
Spain is on lock down. We were there 10 days ago. When we were in Madrid there were only 9 cases in the country. As of today, there are now over 5,000. We feel fine and have no symptoms. For the most part we have been isolated since our return.
The feeling of anxiety is everywhere. One of my sons today was commenting how they will always remember this time. They were too young to remember 9/11 and the days that followed.
Yesterday was a case in point. Colleen and I drove to Cost Co to pick up groceries. It was the first time we have had a chance to go since we have returned from our trip. We were surprised to find the parking lot full, almost like it was a shopping day before Christmas. Inside the lines to the check out were very long. Cart after cart was filled with water, paper towels, or toilet paper. Did we miss a memo? Was there something going on that we did not know?
Large forklifts were bringing in pallets of water. Signs read “1 per customer”. I knew there was concern about the Covid-19 pandemic but why toilet paper?. The day prior our fearless leader gave an address to assuage our fears. Was this hoarding reaction the result? Was a hurricane approaching here in Indiana?
None the less. people smiled nervously at each other and tried to make light of the situation. We got our groceries and after a delay in line we finally got out of the store. (After eating one of the epic hot dogs they serve there).
I , like many people, have a general feeling of unease. I am not sure what to make of the media anymore and the Federal government has proven to be completely unreliable.
I am reminded of the many times we have seen weather predictions of a hurricane approaching the coast. We are told it’s a “Category 5” and it is a ‘God killer’ storm. Good, reliable people admonish people to take shelter immediately. Reporters are dispatched to the area. Then, a Category 1 storm arrives. It’s bad, but not the devastation promised.
It was still a Hurricane though. Damage was done. People were hurt. But, it was not as bad as predicted.
Category 5 storms do exist. They are not imaginary. When they do arrive it is apocalyptic in the level of destruction it can bring. .
Is this a Category 5 situation?
Let’s hope not.
Is this behavior the new normal? David Brooks, the award winning columnist for the New York Times writes it may well be. In his research he writes that we tend to turn inward and self protective during pandemics.
He writes about the Spanish Flu Epidemic , “……….one of the puzzling features of the 1918 pandemic. When it was over, people didn’t talk about it. There were very few books or plays written about it. Roughly 675,000 Americans lost their lives to the flu, compared with 53,000 in battle in World War I, and yet it left almost no conscious cultural mark.
Perhaps it’s because people didn’t like who they had become. It was a shameful memory and therefore suppressed.”
Let’s hope not, but a review of the history of pandemics in the past does not showcase our humanity well.
There is a hope. There is always hope -
Brooks goes on the write, “ Mike Baker recently had a report in The Times about the EvergreenHealth hospital in Kirkland, Wash., where the staff showing the kind of effective compassion that has been evident in all pandemics down the centuries. “We have not had issues with staff not wanting to come in,” an Evergreen executive said. “We’ve had staff calling and say, ‘If you need me, I’m available.
Maybe this time we’ll learn from their example. It also wouldn’t be a bad idea to take steps to fight the moral disease that accompanies the physical one.”
Look for the helpers….
As we left the store we saw one person who seemed different. It was an older woman with what we assumed were her three grandchildren. In her basket she only had two items. They were two large bottles on Maker’s Mark Whiskey.
Maybe she had the right idea.
“Do what you can, with what you’ve got. where you are”
- Theodore Roosevelt.
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