These Dreadful Days

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2022/04/covid-ukraine-anxiety/629540/

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https://archive.ph/QQhhP

“We probably didn’t get COVID in there,” I said to my two doctor friends, grimacing as we put on our masks to board the elevator after a party for parents of kids attending my daughter’s school, where we’d been maskless. Most people I know are vaccinated, and many of them had Omicron in December when seemingly everyone in New York City got Omicron. But here’s the thing: That wasn’t the first time someone’s made a dark joke about the worry over getting COVID; it’s become the go-to joke at every gathering. Low-level fear seems to have permeated everything these days, like the music you hear in elevators or in airport lounges. It’s the hum of dread, the lullaby of anxiety.

Dread doesn’t feel like anything else. It has a clarity to it, a briskness. There is no uncertainty in dread. It’s been 762 days since the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic and finally the vibe has shifted from the abject panic and disbelief of March 2020 to the ubiquitous dread of April 2022.

Late-pandemic dread is nothing new. In the 14th century, Giovanni Boccaccio wrote in The Decameron about the feelings of Florentines during the bubonic plague: “These things and many others like them, or even worse, caused all sorts of fears and fantasies in those who remained alive, almost all of whom took one utterly cruel precaution, namely, to avoid the sick and their belongings, fleeing far away from them, for in doing so they all thought they could preserve their own health.” A sense of hesitation hung over society then, and it has returned for many people now, despite the expectation that vaccinated and healthy, young(ish) people under the age of 65 can resume normal activities, taking some precautions but behaving largely like we did before nearly 1 million Americans died of COVID.

Remember this time last year? We were told we’d get a hot vax summer. The streets would be filled with half-naked people dancing with one another. It would be like Woodstock. We’d call it the roaring 2020s. After all, history is filled with such things. The 1918 flu pandemic was followed by a decade of parties and opulence. Surely, the coronavirus panic would fade into a decade of boom, or at least a summer of it.

*snip*

[Skittles]

1. sometimes

I think essays like this are written by people who never really had to go through crises before.

[Nevilledog]

2. I've never had to go through anything like this pandemic.

Or do you mean in general?

[Skittles]

3. in general

for example, I remember when the pandemic first started, people whining about not being able to physically be with loved ones....I remember thinking, boo fucking hoo.....as a military brat who was frequently overseas, I went YEARS without seeing relatives, and there was no Skype calling or even phone calls (too expensive).....I thought it was ridiculous. I used to draw the outline of my hand on a envelopes to show my grandparents how big I was getting.

And sometimes when I think about what my English mum went through as a child during WWII and seeing now how some people get hysterical over masking or not being able to do a certain activity - I mean, grow the fuck up, ya know?