The sigh of relief that we've been collectively experiencing - here in Vermont, at any rate - as a result of the localized slowdown of Covid-19 transmissions, hospitalizations, and deaths, has come with it a mixture of realizations for me. The most nagging of which, of course, is that knowledge that much of the U.S.'s confidence is, as it has been throughout the last two years, totally unfounded. As much of the rest of world continues to burn, the blatant class privilege that my people luxuriate in, through relatively accessible healthcare, comes at the cost of millions of less-fortunate lives.
Other revelations are more personal: the influx of tourist crowds suddenly clogging my local streets, exacerbating the oppressive heat on these oppressively hot days, brings to mind the relative peace that I enjoyed in the spring of 2020: walking on eerily abandoned streets on quiet, cold nights; driving to work without seeing another soul; running into the shelves-empty grocery, nary a rival shopper about.
The relative quiet that came with everyone holing-up was the main change in my lifestyle, and it was glorious. Having to listen to everyone whinge about how difficult it was to not be with friends, or how difficult to not be able to talk about sports (because there were no sports), or to not casually congregate in public with strangers, was a seemingly endless irritant.
The worst, of course, always being the petulant and infantile 'my rights have been infringed by having to wear masks' contingent, who (I project) are now eyeing me as wetting their charcoals as I continue to mask throughout their glorious 'return to normalcy' campaign.
As I now enter stores and find myself one of the last to be sporting a mask, I am unexpectedly self-conscious. I don't want to continue masking because I'm afraid of transmission, or out of solidarity for those still vulnerable (which is, tbh, the correct answer); I want to continue masking because I've become accustomed to my anonymity, and I don't want to go back to the old normal. Fuck those assholes.
This reasoning is, of course, just as selfish as that of the anti-maskers (and anti-vaxxers, for that matter), and it's a recognition of this selfishness that was the genesis of this weeks' cartoon.
The sigh of relief that we've been collectively experiencing - here in Vermont, at any rate - as a result of the localized slowdown of Covid-19 transmissions, hospitalizations, and deaths, has come with it a mixture of realizations for me. The most nagging of which, of course, is that knowledge that much of the U.S.'s confidence is, as it has been throughout the last two years, totally unfounded. As much of the rest of world continues to burn, the blatant class privilege that my people luxuriate in, through relatively accessible healthcare, comes at the cost of millions of less-fortunate lives.
ReplyDeleteOther revelations are more personal: the influx of tourist crowds suddenly clogging my local streets, exacerbating the oppressive heat on these oppressively hot days, brings to mind the relative peace that I enjoyed in the spring of 2020: walking on eerily abandoned streets on quiet, cold nights; driving to work without seeing another soul; running into the shelves-empty grocery, nary a rival shopper about.
The relative quiet that came with everyone holing-up was the main change in my lifestyle, and it was glorious. Having to listen to everyone whinge about how difficult it was to not be with friends, or how difficult to not be able to talk about sports (because there were no sports), or to not casually congregate in public with strangers, was a seemingly endless irritant.
The worst, of course, always being the petulant and infantile 'my rights have been infringed by having to wear masks' contingent, who (I project) are now eyeing me as wetting their charcoals as I continue to mask throughout their glorious 'return to normalcy' campaign.
As I now enter stores and find myself one of the last to be sporting a mask, I am unexpectedly self-conscious. I don't want to continue masking because I'm afraid of transmission, or out of solidarity for those still vulnerable (which is, tbh, the correct answer); I want to continue masking because I've become accustomed to my anonymity, and I don't want to go back to the old normal. Fuck those assholes.
This reasoning is, of course, just as selfish as that of the anti-maskers (and anti-vaxxers, for that matter), and it's a recognition of this selfishness that was the genesis of this weeks' cartoon.