POSTPONED DUE TO PLAGUE: EVERYTHING

In Monday’s post, Laurie gave us a glimpse of what the coronapocalypse has been like for her in tourism-dependent New Mexico, as someone intimately involved in a sport dependent on spectators (horse racing), with an interdependent infrastructure (not to mention people and animals) that can’t really afford the disruptions the spread of this disease has brought.

All of us here in tourism-dependent North Carolina certainly echo her concerns. Our governor not only closed the schools and nursing homes in the state for an indefinite length of time, but also closed the bars and restaurants (except for takeout orders). In Asheville, a city twenty-five minutes away from where I live, the hospitality industry is the largest employer, and most of that industry’s employees live slim paycheck to paycheck, bolstered by tips, none of which they will now be receiving for an unknown time. 

The bars and restaurants themselves can scarcely afford to lose the income that would normally have come their way this time of year. They exist on the narrowest of margins anyway, with closures a regular occurrence in the best of times. How many will survive this blow is something no one can predict.

In my small town of Marshall, the shuttering of bars and restaurants creates an even bigger dilemma. The few establishments that eke out a living here maintain a razor-thin reserve and support a disproportionate number of the younger members of our community as employees. Some of them are trying to survive by gearing up for take-out with minimal staff. In order to help them, Marshall citizens are ordering take-out when they can, paying online and buying gift certificates for an optimistic future.

And, of course, all of this pushes a ripple effect throughout the economy. Fewer people going out and spending money means suppliers have no customers for what they provide to restaurants, bars, shops and so on. They begin to reduce hours and close, too. It’s no wonder the stock market is falling. We are, unfortunately, a consumer-based economy. If consumers can’t participate, the house of cards collapses.

Early, swift action at the Federal level might have avoided some of the worst of this, but the time is past for that. And, at any rate, the agencies and mechanisms that should have been in place to deal with this national crisis had been gutted, diminished, and denied long ago. 

Our first mistake was to allow profit to rule our health care system, so hospitals operate on an as-needed basis: staffing with only the bare minimum number of doctors and nurses to cover shifts; ordering only enough medications and supplies to cover basic needs for a short period; operating with the fewest beds possible to ensure those beds are filled to capacity to maximize profit. As a result, according to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. can offer an average of only 2.8 beds per 1000 people, as opposed to 4.3 in China, 8.0 in Germany and 12.3 in South Korea, which by all accounts has been handling this outbreak like a champ.

So, we started out short of medical personnel, short of hospital capacity, short of basic supplies. Then we refused outside help, in the form of testing kits from the World Health Organization. As a result, we’re critically far behind on testing those who may be have been exposed to the virus or may actually be sick with it. And, it appears, the few tests that are available are being given not to the most vulnerable among us, but to celebrities and political A-listers. The official answer to why that is? A shrug. Oh, and a suggestion to governors that they try to get their own crucial supplies.

 

Yep, we were made for this!

Okay, so now we’re here. What’s to do? For those of us who are natural-born introverts, social distancing is no great sacrifice. Everyone who knows me is aware I have a HUGE personal bubble anyway. The only problem is, we may be cooped up with the more extroverted members of our households for the near future. They’ll be sharing our space and our quiet time, destroying our hopes for all the work we’d planned to get done in this time of limited outside engagement!

Some practical suggestions, then:

 --Headphones!—For those times when my husband and I both work from home, I slap on the headphones and check out YouTube for binaural beats, a type of electronic music that research shows can improve your focus, healing, happiness, sleep and a host of other good things. You can use it for meditation practice, too, but I find it drowns out phone conversations from the next office over just great.


--Go outside!—Fortunately for everybody, and most especially for parents of kids of all ages, this outbreak happened at the beginning of spring. Unless it’s pouring rain or blowing snow, get outside for a walk or a few minutes in the yard. You can work in the early garden or play with the dog (who is already ecstatic that you’re home!). Local and state parks remain open, and national parks are waiving fees right now, hoping that most people will find it easy to maintain a decent distance in the great outdoors. Besides, it’s been proven that COVID-19 doesn’t like fresh air and sunshine. 

--Virtual tours!—When the weather won’t allow it, take a virtual tour of a national park or a museum or an aquarium. They’re free and guaranteed to keep you and/or your little ones occupied for hours. After all, there is only so much Sesame Street or Disney you can take. Google Earth offers tours of 31 National Parks; Google Earth and 12 world-famous museums teamed up for virtual tours of their collections; the National Aquariums at Baltimore and Washington D.C. offer virtual tours (after all, the sea creatures don’t have to practice social distancing); another site allows you to travel virtually around the world on your computer or big-screen television; and more than a thousand colleges and universities offer virtual tours of their campuses if your teenager is looking for school in the fall (just check online for the school of your choice). The only problem may be access to enough Internet bandwidth to do everything we all want to do. 

--Reviews!—Remember all those books you read and still need to review for Goodreads? (Or maybe that’s just me.) At least this is a good time to whittle down the TBR pile. And I'm hoping to get to a few reviews while I’m at it.
 

It’s a new day, after all. Might as well make the best of it.

Stay well, 
Donna