I need some new scripts, I think.
It looks like we're going to be living for a while with masks and social distancing, and there is already opposition to those things among a subset of the population. So I'm looking for clear, friendly ways to say "Hey, let's move six feet apart" and also "Hey, your mask doesn't protect anyone if it's only covering your chin."
(Okay, this may be an unhelpful digression, but I feel that I could approach the task of trying out new scripts with more equanimity if I understood it better. Like, sure, lobby for your business to be considered essential or for modifications of your state's reopening plan. Peaceful assembly and petition -- it's in the Constitution and we should all support it. But the idea that we have a right to infect our neighbors with a new and highly contagious and fairly deadly disease -- what "right" could that possibly be? And the ugly ageist ableist assumptions lurking in their eagerness to dismiss the mortality risk? Coming from folks who voted for Trump because, allegedly, protecting human life was their #1 priority? This does not make any sense to me.)
So when I go for a walk around a nearby lake and people are smack in the middle of the trail, making it impossible for me to stay six feet away unless I detour into the mud, I don't know quite what to say. I would prefer to visit the lake occasionally. I would also prefer not to keep tromping into the mud. And I worry that the politicization of our responses to COVID-19 means that a friendly "six feet apart, please" or "can you give me a little more space, please?" will be interpreted as "look, here is someone who probably voted for Hillary because she hates unborn babies."
Yesterday a guy came to take a look at our roof, which has been leaking around the chimney in the wake of the rain deluging the Midwest. It was an extremely annoying visit. We thought that our roof had a ten-year guarantee, but this guy is telling us we need to have some work done on the chimney to the tune of $500. My irritation is compounded by the fact that he always wants to talk primarily to Elwood. Inwardly I'm like, "Listen, buddy, I'm the one who scheduled the appointment; I'm the one who will write the check. This is not 1955 and I do not need my husband's permission to hire you." This would have been vexing under any circumstances, but yesterday I was further annoyed by his decision to wear a mask that didn't cover his nose and to stand too close to my husband. "I don't have any cooties," he said. "I see my doctor regularly."
This is a new social situation, and I am not sure the old rules apply. Normally I would not start a dispute over science with a tradesperson in my home; normally I would not say "Back up, pal, because your doctor is not capable of telling you whether you're shedding the virus asymptomatically at this moment!" I did not do these things yesterday. But my decision not to push back niggled at me for the rest of the day.
Have I told you all about my hamster ball idea? I am thinking of starting a company that manufactures human hamster balls. If we all went about in hamster balls with a six-foot diameter, then social distancing would be effortless! Yesterday I also mused about a paramecium costume, with 6-foot cilia dangling all over. It would have an internal mechanism -- a switch or a pump or something -- that would cause the cilia to stop dangling and project outwards if you felt that someone nearby was failing to observe social distancing norms. One of my kids is observing that Soviet-era gas masks are available for only $20 on eBay, if I feel the need for a more emphatic statement about the importance of protecting one's airway.
What I actually need to be thinking about is how to be both clear and cordial. If I just say, "Could you pull your mask up, please?" and then let any eye-rolling flow right off my back, that's probably a better solution than manufacturing a spiky paramecium costume.
How's it going for you? Do you have stories and/or scripts to share? It's a weird time to be alive for sure.
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