As of now, 44 people in Wallowa County have tested positive for Covid-19. Six of them are people I know as friends; that number could be higher. All have been hit recently, and again, as far as I know, only one hospitalized and all OK. The seventh friend is a woman who used to live here and now lives in Bend; she was seriously ill and unconscious in the first spring round of Covid.
About thee weeks ago I woke up in the middle of the night and stumbled into the bathroom. My head was spinning, as it sometimes does when I just bounce to my feet too fast, but this time it wouldn’t stop spinning. I got back to bed and made it back to a fitful sleep, woke early and stumbled through the day with what felt like a hangover.
And I started thinking, going through the signs of Covid. I didn’t have a cough, I didn’t have a sore throat or trouble breathing. I went on my morning bike ride and found that I could smell the fall leaf turnings and chimney smoke; I recalled tasting the morning coffee.
But even then I began cataloging the people I had been in contact with: co-workers; old Peace Corps friends who had parked their RV in my driveway overnight a few days prior; people in stores….
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My friend Bob announced his contagion on Facebook, said that he was generally careful about masking and distancing, but had made a trip out of the county and been careless. And brought it home. Another friend is announcing on Facebook, and others are self-quarantining.
It strikes me that this Covid must be working its way into the minds of many Americans as it has mine. And that others are rejecting it wholesale with denial.
Caution is prudent, but we cannot be personally immobilized. I have fear for us, and hope that we continue to act prudently. But I have fear of deniers. People hold onto incorrect beliefs tenaciously, and deal with realities by irrationalities, raising their voices and trumpeting their denial.
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