Individually together

            By the time this paper is in your hands, we will have survived a week of the COVID-19 coming too close to home. A week of panic, drastic decisions, and stress. A week of the best and worst of community.

            A week ago, I would have told you that everyone was seriously overreacting. That businesses, and governments were making rash, silly decisions. Over the past few days I've come to realize just how wrong I was. Where I was looking at quarantine and "social isolation" as over-reactive scare-inducing propagandist foolishness, I failed to understand what quarantine actually means. What its for. And most importantly that it actually works - history has proven it over and over again.

            I was walking around thinking, I'm healthy; I'm not that worried. After all, it's just the flu right? Selfish and near-sighted is what that is. Given just a little thought past my own self, I realized, I have a son who was just diagnosed with asthma. I have a husband whose white blood cell count is usually a bit low, since he had cancer years ago. Not so simple for them. I care about people all over this country who deal with diabetes, high blood pressure, immune-deficiency issues, or are just simply very old — or very young. Given a moment to get past my own self-centeredness, I realize it is a problem. And it is my problem, along with everyone else's.

            So here is how I understand this works. The coronavirus' incubation period is 2 to 14 days. That means possibly two weeks from when you were exposed to when you actually start showing symptoms. By the time you realize you're sick, you've already exposed everyone. Everyone you come into contact in the past two weeks. By association, you've also exposed everyone with whom those people have come into contact as well. I don't want to expose that many people! And I sure don't want that many people exposing me.

            There isn't a vaccine - yet. There will be, but that could take a year, or more. The only way to slow down, maybe even stop the spread is for everyone to stay right where they are for two weeks. If we can do that, then the medical professionals just might be able to isolate and contain it. The problem is - everyone has to participate, or it doesn't work.

            Did you know that the word "quarantine" means forty days? It comes from the 40-day isolation of ships and people entering Venice during the plague. Yes, that plague, from the 14th century!

            The truth is, social isolation works. And it's our best bet for getting to the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic. It takes some time, it takes some effort and sacrifice, but most importantly, it takes all of us participating individually together.