7 Useless Thoughts About The Forgotten Pandemic
Dalgona coffee, Tiger King, Banana Bread.
They all seemed like a lifetime away.
How about clapping and cheering on our terraces at 7’oclock at night? Or that season when we considered the fellows who stocked our grocery shelves as absolute heroes, as patriotic as the great Andrew Cuomo.
As the pandemic becomes ever blurrier from the rearview mirror of our collective consciousness, I thought of typing down those handwritten thoughts I had when Covid was all the rage.
I remember, back in 2020, I had thoughts. While we were in the thick of it, I had some time on my hands. So I decided to start an unlikely, and probably useless, personal tradition…that is, I began thinking.
And so let me share with you some of the mental ramblings that have been running through my mind back in 2020. You know, the usual mindless jabber that happens in the head when the stomach is dealing with indigestion.
Here we go:
# 1 “Collateral Damage”
I couldn’t help but feel for the viruses and bacteria (not COVID) that had to die because COVID was such a show-off.
Suddenly, the world was flushed with disinfectant chemicals. Everybody fancied themselves a “ghostbuster” of sorts — holding a spray in each hand.
I didn’t think I’d live through a time when people had one spray to sanitize all suspect surfaces…and another to sanitize the sanitizing spray, because, you know…invisible enemy.
I weep for all those innocent germs, bacteria, and viruses that would have lived full lives on our doorknobs, kitchen counters, phones, and remote controls. All because one virus decided to flex and said, “Hold my beer. Imma do something with their baseball and football seasons.”
People who were complete slobs in ordinary times suddenly went über sterile, using industrial-strength cleaners that melted steel — slaughtering billions in the process.
How dare we kill these microorganisms that are only silently infecting us!
I got a feeling that kind of karma will hit back.
# 2 What’s in me…was in you.
I never realized just how connected we really are — breath-wise. We’re literally inhaling remnants of each other.
The hours of animated news footage of nasal droplets going from one person to another…got to me.
“You mean it’s not just those tangy farts I’m inhaling into my throat?!” I’m already wary of getting into crowded elevators, buses, trains, and beds. When this is all over and we’re allowed to hug and kiss each other again, I’ll probably still be elbowing acquaintances…like I do family.
It’s awkward, but I don’t want to be tasting what a stranger had last night.
# 3 “He was hot…’til he opened his mouth.”
One should never judge people on looks, I know that, but the number of times I thought somebody was hot…until they removed their mask.
One skill I’ve developed in the past two years is recognizing people just by the top half of their faces — their eyebrows and forehead. (Comes in handy when you’re searching for your landlord, who you haven’t paid in months, at the grocery store.)
For complete strangers and people I’ve never met, I’m usually the trusting, “glass half full” type of guy assuming the best in people. So when they remove the mask, I go, “Uh, okay.”
I’m not swiping left or anything, and this is not “shaming” of some kind, it just kind of reminds me of those times when some hot guy takes off his sunglasses. And with it, one’s interest.
# 4 Nothin’ beats a Google Search at 2 in the morning…
2020 was the year I thought myself more brilliant than a medical doctor.
Can’t count the number of times when I’m watching a medical expert being interviewed and inside I’m screaming, “No, you’re wrong! This virus is different! Look at the data. Geeez.”
I thought myself an expert on infectious diseases, and more informed than someone who’s spent an entire lifetime studying coronaviruses…just because I spent 4-hours on Google researching the topic — armed with the strictest journalistic standard: Not Wikipedia.
I should remind myself: You barely passed Calculus, genius.
# 5 How to slow down when there’s no traffic
If you haven’t “slowed down” in 2020…you missed the bus…big time. (And it’s a wonder because that bus was standing still.)
2020 was the year when the world stopped…literally. If there ever was a time to chill, smell the flowers or take an account of one’s life, it was 2020.
I mean, schools were closed, your boss didn’t want you in the office, and even your grandparents didn’t want you around.
In this perfect space, when everything stood still if you still managed to make yourself busier and more tired than when commuting to work every day, then there’s something wrong with you.
There’s something wrong with me.
# 6 Keep your “receipts.”
It sucks that I’d have to wait for a new generation to be born before all my COVID stories become: “Really?! No way!”
The panic on toilet paper, the few weeks of fawning over Governor Como, bingeing on Tiger King — these were practically universal experiences. You can’t say “You had to be there…” because every last one of us was there.
But I’m keeping my “receipts” — my quarantine passes, vaccination records, and all my 2020 memorabilia. So that in the coming decades, when I tell the story of 2020, I’ll have the “receipts” to slap my entitled grandchildren with.
# 7 A green screen full of books…and a little plant on the side.
Zoom, Instagram, and Facebook saved our lives more than we realize
Who would have thought that we are such slobs?!
In the early months of the pandemic, with no place to go, no office or school to drive to, we forgot how to look human. Without the possibility of our faces showing up in public, we didn’t shave, soap or shower. We luxuriated in 5-day-old pajamas and Cheetos-stained wife beaters. (The irony is that we’ve managed to be dirty and disinfected both at the same time!)
Thank you green screen for making it look like we are put together, lived in clean houses, and are well-read.
When the truth is, if not for those regular selfies posted on Instagram and Facebook, we wouldn’t even brush the apple pie crumbs off our hair. If not for the occasional Zoom meeting, we wouldn’t tidy up and present a livable living room, filled with unread books of leisure and a plant on the side.
Perhaps it's the toxic fumes I’ve intentionally inhaled to stay healthy, I’ve been unusually contemplative that year. That’s what happens when you’ve gone through all the summaries on Netflix and still couldn’t find something worth dozing off to.
2020 has got Stephen King beat. If anybody from 2019 would tell me that a killer virus would be unleashed from a Chinese lab/or a market of exotic animals, and would ignite a global pandemic and cause otherwise rational people to stock up on toilet paper and sprinkle bleach on their salad, I’d say, “Who directed that thriller, and is that on Netflix?”
But yeah, that happened.
May we not forget.
