Guten tag!
Trying to come up with something succinct in my head to write about Covid proved too difficult this weekend. As I mentioned, I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about the ongoing pandemic, and they’re a bit jumbled, but a lot of them are related anyway, so let me cook as the kids say!
One thing that worries me is that we all collectively have very short attention spans, and these days, that’s just built into our society. Think about it. When’s the last time you got to properly mourn something before the next catastrophic natural disaster or the next mass shooting? Even in daily life. I didn’t quite need the time to grieve my grandparents’ deaths the way the rest of my family did because I know grieving them will just be a small part of the rest of my life. But in this case, it has been 5 years since grandma and 4 since pops (hopefully the math is mathing on that last one), and my mom has just finally allowed herself to grieve for them. There was the mortgage on their house, paying for the cremation and memorials, the life insurance, moving things out of their house so my uncle could live there… Life has been so complicated that no one really gets a break.
With Covid, there’s way more than just grieving the dead. In fact, that whole period of the government taking Covid seriously revealed A LOT.
Some we have absolutely no direct control over, but I think being able to openly express frustration about them, even though no one can do much to help or fix it (besides giving us space to feel how we feel), is very healthy. Others, we can and should lean into community to help alleviate.
One lesson that hits pretty close to home is that doing things to accommodate disabled people, particularly in the work force (for a population that is either forced near poverty to keep their benefits, underpaid because ableism, or just way underpaid compared to expenses) are perfectly within employers’ capabilities, they just don’t want to. At least now quite a few companies have decided to continue hybrid policies.
Speaking of, children being spared from constant exposure and having online learning taught everyone how impossible it is to actually care for a family while also being expected to be at a job all day. Being a stay-at-home parent is largely a pipedream on both ends, because it will always lead to burn out. One will always be burnt out from having to work way more than anyone ever should to compensate, and the other will be saddled with all domestic duties likely without any help whatsoever.
The pressure on businesses to prioritize healthy work-life balance needs to be something we keep up going into the future. If I see any of you bragging about how much better you do someone else’s bidding as if that’s inherently something to be proud of and valued/paid for, I will probably scream.
The last little practically identical lesson I want to comment on today is how so many things are so much harder because of how society conceives of who are your people. Family hasn’t exactly dwindled so much that extended relatives are insignificant in a family unit, but I will argue that the focus on the nuclear family (perfect little Mom, Dad, two kids structure) has done a lot of harm to how we view each other. And yes, I will be doing full-blown posts on that specific topic.
For example, I´ve been binging Reservation Dogs a bit off and on lately, and the veneration they all have for their elders (and not based on some ¨ I’m older so you have to respect me¨ thing) is beautiful. Couldn´t you imagine how much better off we might be if multi-generational households were the norm? Maybe we would actually be more willing to learn from other people, to appreciate their wisdom, to learn different ways to care for each other, and to seek help because they aren’t also saddled with their own home + finances. On the other side of that, just maybe the elderly wouldn´t decline quite so quickly, because they would have people around them to invigorate them and keep them company.
I actually had to choose carefully what points I wanted to hit because I have a good way to segue into some community opportunities and I didn’t want to jump the gun. Thursday will be more ranting, but next week will be the meat and potatoes. I look forward to stringing you along just a little bit more!
Until then,
Salud!
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