Wisconsin’s Morning News cohort Mike Spaulding put it best the Friday before last when he said as the show was about to begin, “What a year it’s been this week.”
Indeed.
As March morphs into April, you can’t help to be amazed at just how much happened this past month, little of it admittedly good for the species. March came in like the proverbial lamb in Milwaukee with a high of 58 degrees and thoughts of an early spring running wild. Corona-virus had yet to disrupt life was we know it in the U-S. We went to movies, gathered at bars, ate at restaurants, sent kids to school. Toilet paper sat in abundance on grocery store shelves. The Bucks had the NBA’s best record. The Brewers were toiling away in the Arizona sun. Marquette and Wisconsin were headed to their conference tournaments and then, hopefully, to bigger and better as part of March Madness.
What madness it would be.
March 1 would be the day New York logged its first case of Covid 19. The country recorded its second death. The feds were trying to get their heads around a flaw in the CDC test kits that had been sent to labs weeks before in anticipation of an outbreak of a disease we were just hearing about as the new decade began. What was deemed as a “pneumonia of unknown cause” was getting traction in China December 31. The World Health Organization would declare a global health emergency a month later. A planet that had heard dire warnings before about the onset of Monkey Pox, SARS and MERS in the past without life as we know it being even mildly disrupted pretty much carried on–after all, how bad could a virus sharing its name with a Mexican beer be?
Beware the Ides of March–the 11th day of the month, to be precise. As President Trump boasted of our national preparedness–“The virus will not have a chance against us”–on prime time TV, the NBA was postponing its season after Utah Jazz star Rudy Gobert tested positive for Covid 19. Within minutes came news that Tom Hanks and wife Rita Wilson had it. The country would pivot in about 20 minutes that evening, from thinking coronavirus was the another part of the world’s problem to the grim realization that it was ours, too. Global markets plunged, other sports leagues pro and college postponed seasons and tournaments. Governments imposed bans on groups of 500. Then 50. Soon it was ten or less.
And here we are now, “safe at home.” We aren’t talking baseball here, either. “Social distancing” and “flattening the curve” are the rally cries of a nation and a world confronting something we haven’t seen the likes of since, what, the Spanish Flu at the end of World War I? We’ve been through tons since–a second global conflict and other wars too numerous/deadly to mention, assassinations, fractures between the generations, Watergate and the ensuing loss of faith in our national institutions as well as terrorism and toxic political U-S political polarization.
No matter the situation, though, we still had a sense of “normal” and knew where we could find it: you could still hoist one at the corner bar and commiserate with friends/co-workers about events of the day, or grab a bite at your favorite eatery. You could still take a van-full of kids to the next practice/game/movie unencumbered. The routine of work that could seem so mind-numbing in quiet times would prove to be a comfort when it seemed all that was out of our control was, well, out of control. And no matter what, there was always home where family could gather from everywhere to share a meal, a laugh, a cry, or a hug.
Remember hugs?
The war analogy is made anew, and it’s an apt one. Conventional battle features an enemy that can be seen, confronted, and hopefully defeated. In this fight, the bad guy is invisible to the naked eye and potentially lethal if contracted. It is one to hide from, as it proliferates on what we love the most–being with each other. Wars require sacrifice on the battlefield and at home. This battle merges the two: home IS the battlefield, as is the workplace or any other location we dare to gather. Conventional war claims the conscript. This one doesn’t look at uniform, age, color or gender.
It’s too early to talk about a return to where we were as February 29 became March 1. This is no time to point fingers. There’s an virus out there that’s killing people and will keep doing so unless we’re smart. A world that wants everything NOW, be it a cheeseburger or the newest gadget from Amazon, is finding out he hard way that biology and science reign, that it is they who will set the clock and calendar. This ain’t “Tiger King” where the story arc wraps up in seven neat episodes that run 47 minutes each (I know, because I devoured it this past rainy, cold Saturday).
And that’s another point: yes, this is deadly serious stuff, but it’s okay to divert, to look away from cable news and social media. Read a book. Binge a show. Reacquaint with your spouse (the Muellers plan to re-learn cribbage, which we haven’t played in earnest since we were newlyweds). Bigger minds than mine suggest that we practice “physical distancing” while remaining social: the last word in “cellphone” is “phone” which means it can both make AND receive calls. We’re all getting crash courses in various video platforms served up by the likes of Facebook, Zoom and Microsoft Teams (our company’s medium of choice to do business). The virtual happy hour replaces the corner-tap version. We’ll only get more creative as the pandemic grinds on.
It’s been said that this situation won’t be the end of civilization, but that it will instead show vividly where its cracks are. Gaping ones are out there already for all to see. More will make themselves apparent. We’ll get through this first and then go about making needed repairs. We’ll have to act as if there will be a “next time” because assuming there won’t be would be pure folly.
2020 was to be a helluva year for Milwaukee: a Bucks team that was the NBA’s best, a DNC convention that was to put our community on the global stage, not to mention all that the end of winter brings to a region that does warm weather like none other. I’ve heard more than one person say that what’s happening is just so….typical to those of us who’ve lived here for a while, the feeling that just when something really big, cool, good or amazing is about to happen to Milwaukee, reality interferes.
This is bigger than that. Yes, it truly sucks that opportunities are being lost, big chances denied, but we can land fresh shots moving forward, sooner if we listen up, play smart, stay put and truly remain “safe at home.” And wash our hands.
Goodbye, March 2020. In like a lamb. Out like something we haven’t seen the likes of in about a century or so. A month for the history books, 30 days to be endured for now and remembered forever, one filled with weeks that did, indeed, feel like years.
To a better April…and good health everywhere.
