Honestly, y’all, this has been so hard to write. I couldn’t figure out how to start without being overly mushy or saying a bunch of unnecessary shit. I don’t even know if there are words to adequately summarize into a cute preface what experiencing this pandemic has been like. It has been a whirlwind of information, misinformation, anxiety, sadness, fear, helplessness, confusion, incomprehensible exhaustion, resignation, rock bottom, allat. So I’m just going to dive in.
A while back I was talking to one of my close friends about how, as friends, we get to share this really solid foundation that allows us to be curious with one another without it feeling reproachful or admonishing. I know that as my friends, if you’re asking me to explain my thought process about something, it’s out of a desire to understand me better, not out of a desire to patronize me. This particular thing I’m asking you about is a matter of life and death, it’s a matter of surviving. I hope you believe me when I say that I’m writing you with love.
Months ago I read a post by someone who very astutely observed that we are watching the trial and error of science in real-time in ways we have not before. Most of the time when scientists and doctors fight new illnesses they do it from the privacy of their labs. All of the theorizing and all of the mistakes happen behind closed doors and between the lines of medical journals that the majority of the general population does not and cannot read. I know it’s frustrating and exhausting to be told so many conflicting things while not being given the adequate tools to weather this storm. I know that we’re lied to so much by our government that it’s difficult to know what to really trust. I know that everyone is tired, stir crazy, scared, and so sad for many reasons. I understand being over it, but I can’t understand being so over it that you’d throw caution to the wind almost entirely. I don’t understand taking unnecessary risks, putting others in unnecessary danger.
What I know to be true about all of you is that you are critical thinkers. The Covid-19 survival rate may be 99%, but the death toll in our country alone has been 352,000, the majority of whom are Black and brown people. What’s more, we will continue to lose people in unfathomable numbers if we can’t get this under control now. Our barrel of resources will dry up. With Covid running rampant and uncontrolled our hospitals will fill up and there will not be enough ventilators or staff or medicine to go around to treat those infected, much less everyone else who goes into the ER for any other routine emergency. If you’re in a car accident, if you have an allergic reaction, if you get kidney stones, there will be no beds for you to lie in and no doctors to take care of you. People will die because there simply won’t be enough doctors or medicine or time to save them. And we will be starting from that enormous deficit of care because we aren’t making the sacrifices we need to make now.
Some of you, my friends, have not stopped dining out this entire time. Some of you have continued to travel nonstop, sometimes to islands that are exponentially more susceptible to ruin because of this pandemic. How do you justify bringing your germs to them? How do you justify that biological violence? Some of you have been at casinos, waterparks over the summer, parties, happy hour every weekend like clockwork. If you know, and I know you do, that none of those places should even be open to begin with, then why are you going? I don’t mean this to sound demanding, I am so ardently, genuinely curious. Because again, you are my friends, and so I know you all to be incredibly nuanced thinkers, I know you to be critical. And I know you have followed along as our government grossly mishandles this whole situation. I know you’ve watched them reopen nonessential establishments prematurely and give massive financial relief to big corporations instead of canceling rent and paying people to stay home.
So how can you justify knowing the government’s recommendations are bad and following them anyway? How do you justify the risk to your servers as you sit maskless, spitting your germs at them while you order? “Well, I wear a mask when I’m ordering.” Okay, then still I ask, how do you justify contributing to the demand that’s keeping servers hostage in this lose-lose situation where they’re not making ends meet, much less hazard pay, AND they’re in incredible danger every day? Every time you dine in it incentivizes restaurant owners, upon seeing your patronage, to stay open for dine-in service, forcing their employees to come in despite how sick they are or how dangerous it is.
Now, in all fairness, dining in both indoor and outdoor should not be allowed at all yet while we are still facing peak Covid numbers. Ideally, restaurants would be closed entirely, all rent would be canceled, and we would all be receiving a livable pandemic unemployment wage. That’s the government’s failing, that’s not on us. And when the government fails it puts an undue responsibility on us to pick up their slack, and that’s where so much of this is going wrong. Rather than calling for delivery or pick up, you show up at restaurants because you want to go out. You take a Covid test on Tuesday, even though you were out and about on Monday, and when it comes back negative on Wednesday you swear you’re in the clear. It doesn’t work that way, and most of you know that it doesn’t work that way. So how do you justify your carelessness? Why do you justify it?
Are you resigned? Are you numb to this reality? Have you reached your limit? I love you and I’m really asking because I miss you all terribly. Now that I’m back in New York I wish I could see you safely, but so many of you have been exposing yourselves and others to this virus. So many of you have behaved irresponsibly and I’m so confused by it, and I’m kind of pissed at y’all, but mostly I’m sad and scared. I’m sad because it’s hard to watch your loved ones put themselves at risk. I’m sad because I miss you and I want to hug you. I’m sad because I don’t know what the fuck I would do if I ever woke up to the news that one of my friends was gone.
So can we talk? I don’t know how to end this except can we all, myself included, reflect and talk? Maybe I’m missing something, maybe my own anxiety is making me overly harsh about this, but I want to talk.
Originally published at https://www.lannyanais.com on December 31, 2021.
