A Coronavirus Spring
Just a few months ago, death was a faraway concept to me and most other twenty-year olds. We were supposed to live as if life is the only thing possible. Now, death is on the mind. It was present from the time our cellphones buzzed with an update from CNN on March 11th: “The World Health Organization officially declares the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic.” Soon, our own loved ones began to fall ill. Yesterday: “Grim coronavirus milestone: US surpasses half a million cases.” Today: “The United States is now reporting more coronavirus deaths than any other country.” Naturally, we need to hear about it all day long. So my family ensures that MSNBC is blaring on the TV constantly. And when I decide to take a break and go outside, never fear, Chris Hayes’s voice still graces me from my dad’s iPhone, which sits in his pocket as he waters the garden.
Meanwhile, flowers bloom and birds sing. It’s spring! It’s SPRING, everyone! Chipmunks race around, squirrels do their squirrel thing, and dogs wag their tails in glee, rejoicing to have their humans home. It turns out that we are the only species who knows what is going on.
What is there to do when the human species is falling apart around you? Well, it depends. Do you have a house with plenty of space? Do you get to work from home? Do you have enough food? I do. So what do I do when the human species is falling apart? Write a paper for my anthropology class. Bake some brownies. Cry once a day in the comfort of my own bedroom. Feel utterly helpless and painfully lucky. It is a strange thing to reckon with my sheltered life knowing that sickness, poverty and domestic abuse are running rampant. Somewhere nearby, a single mother has been laid off from her job and is drowning in anxiety as she tries to support her kids. A woman with no escape begs her husband not to hit her again. That husband’s AA meetings and counseling sessions have been canceled. Without anyone to turn to, he has one more drink, the one that will lead to another and another until the last.
I have to fight my inclination to be absolutely brutal and instead, try to be kind. God, I wish I could be the person I was before COVID-19 with no consequences. Someone who preaches gratitude but still finds comfort in taking certain things for granted. I cringe as my mom gasps loudly at the latest news. I’m pissed when my dad heads to Costco once again, as if we need twenty more frozen pizzas more than we need to not get sick. When my parents fight, I want to tell them to get a divorce already. I want to yell at my brother for playing Minecraft all day when he should be checking in on his friends. I want to scream at the people I am closest with (and our broken leadership and the rest of the world, while I’m at it). But I don’t get to do that. Because death is on the mind, and with that, everything is precarious. An unseen force could take away every life that I’ve come to depend on.
There is a tall tree by my house with a trunk that is covered in dark green ivy. It is beautiful, but we’ve been meaning to cut it down because an arborist once told us that it wasn’t safe. It leans slightly, always threatening to fall and crash through the windows of my mom’s office while she’s working or my parents’ bedroom while they're sleeping. Now, whenever the wind blows, I hold my breath, sure that it will fall. My dad’s voice comes to me in these moments, telling me what he told me as a child when I wanted to believe in magic: “Nothing is impossible.” I suddenly recognize the fragility of those I love. My parents are not getting any younger. Lucy, who lives on the ground level of our house, is 95. My dog is about to turn 13.
I am not a natural optimist. But at this time, it is best that we avoid misery whenever we can. So we remind ourselves that human life will probably go on. For the price of millions of lives, billions of others will make it. If it’s true that “nothing is impossible,” the apocalypse is possible, and the end of all times. But so is a better world on the other side; one where birds sing in rejoice of spring, and we do, too.
