This article is a delicate balancing act. And I’m a man who has tripped and biffed on the pavement at the rate of about once a year since 2014. So I’m at a disadvantage to begin with.
This is going to be a balancing act because I don’t write about politics on this blog. And some people file this subject under politics. But I’m going to try, desperately, hamhandedly, to strip the politics out of this and just write about my personal frustration and concern.
In March of 2020 the “good” was taken out of the good life in Nebraska. For some of us anyway. The coronavirus made our daily lives different. Worse. Challenging. And I say this as someone who, through some kind of miracle, got to keep going to work everyday. (I can’t host a morning radio program from my apartment building because the arguments from the couple downstairs would get our FCC license revoked.)
For a while in those dark days of March and April and May of 2020, we were all in this together. We mourned together. We hoped together that something would fix this.
But some people decided pretty quickly that they just didn’t care. Some of them were in a place to say “I shouldn’t host events right now”, but did the opposite. And so “in this together”– despite pleading, heartfelt messages from hospital employees and other essential workers–just sort of went away.
Fortunately, the COVID vaccine arrived. And a walloping 31% of the people where I live got it. (#betterthanbranson)
I got it. Multiple people in my life got it. Some people in my life did not get it. They have their reasons. I take them at their word that their reasons are legitimate. But I know a lot of people have no legitimate reason. “Ahhhh, I don’t get sick” isn’t a reason. “I don’t wanna feel lousy for a day or two after I get the shot” is not a legitimate reason. “I voted for/didn’t vote for (WHOEVER)” is not a legitimate reason. “I saw a thing on Facebook that said” is not a legitimate reason.
So now, as the cases soar again nationwide I feel like a man with six months to live.
If we go back to lockdown and I go back to splitting my entire time on planet earth between my apartment and my workplace, that to me is not living. That is existing. And I did that for a damn year. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I did what you would call “social activities” between March 2020 and when I got the vaccine in Spring of ’21. So I’ve had enough of that, thank you very much.
I’ve been using the hashtag “summerofdoingthings” since Memorial Day whenever I get out and do something fun. Because I still feel incredibly lucky that I can do this stuff again. But I also feel like I’m on borrowed time.. Nebraska is a state that is on the laissez-faire side of this whole COVID business. Over and over again during the initial pandemic, things would improve slightly, incrementally…and then the state would drop all restrictions and boom, cases surge back up again.
Now, to be clear…like I said, I got the vaccine. I’m good. But if cases keep going up, those of us who did the right thing are going to be lumped in with those who were too stubborn, shortsighted or just plain slack-jawed stupid to do the one single thing that could keep them and those around them doing the things that make Nebraska the good life. We’ll all be masking it up again (or arguing with some poor soul at Safeway that we don’t have to). We’ll all be in lockdown again (except those of us who never did lockdown, never changed anything about their life and possibly endangered the lives of their friends neighbors and loved ones in the process). We’ll all be waiting for booster shots of the vaccine. (Well, 31% of us will.)
Did I say “six months to live”? Maybe three months is a safer bet.
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