Living, coping and observing in the age of Covid #5

Jan 2021:

WHAT is it that they don’t understand?

Are the almost 100,000 deaths so beyond comprehension that they believe them to be a total fiction?

Do the BBC’s recent series of excruciating hospital scenes unnerve them so much that they dismiss them as some horror drama rescheduled to replace the nightly news?

How can anyone with an ounce of compassion still stirring in their soul confront exhausted hospital staff to deride them for devoting hours of draining physical and emotional energy to keeping their fellow beings from an agonising death?

The Covid-19 deniers are beyond belief.

The anti-vaxxers are staggering in their nonsensical claims. Conspiracy theories are their bread and butter. Their unmasked mouths pour out foul and tainted false beliefs.

While wishing Covid-related harm to no one, one cannot but help wonder how strong their resolve would be if they or their nearest and dearest suffered a close encounter with the pandemic.

Maybe this is the only way to make them see reason; at least reconsider their abrasive opposition and abusive confrontations.

Poignant appeals for understanding are made daily by sufferers and those around them. Their plea is  simple: to abide by the rules, to follow the guidelines and understand that no one is immune and there is no early warning system. It is a bullet impossible to dodge.

A chastening and alarming situation. Also a depressing one, as the headlines daily inform us with their endless guides to fighting depression, decreasing depression, living with depression, eating with depression, jogging with depression, and on and on and on.

No wonder so many, even the once permanently upbeat and ever-smiling optimists, are now down in the deepest dumps wondering if they will ever climb up out of the pit of doom.

Do we really need these daily additional reminders of how things are? Shuttered shops, deserted streets, unsmiling faces hidden behind masks and scarves  are surely sufficient.

There is much positive news behind the outward gloom. Stories of survival, of sacrifice, of renewal, of caring and friendship. Some are at last making their way into the news pages and bulletins. But we need more. Nothing is forever and the positive can help so much in overcoming the negative.

A small start would be for everyone to stop posting and sharing downbeat (and often unsourced and questionable) social media posts.

“Three more Covid deaths” ran the first FB post of today. Yes, right, that was last night’s news story. Do we need it to be repeated?

A stale side order with the coffee and toast that we can well do without. Go wallow in your own misery.

Leave the rest of us to take heart that the sun has risen for another day. Up and rising – an example we should all strive to emulate.