Covid: A patient's confession (Part 4): A mediocre recovery?
3 days ago I got my passport to what used to the be called normal: a negative test. My symptoms have receded but I am still pathetically weak. Meanwhile the world has not recovered at all.
A negative test is just a measurement taken at a point in time. It is not a prognosis. Meanwhile, my symptoms are still around, but not at a debilitating level anymore. I am not so much “better” as I am no longer so sick. I taught an in-person class yesterday, came home exhausted and immediately fell asleep. This is the tedious part: I used to cycle 12 km a day back and forth to work at a local community college, plus worked out with weights and did callisthenics. But that was then. While I was sick with Covid, I was able to teach online. Now walking up a few flights of stairs requires grit, a bit of cursing and a rest at my destination. Naps are an essential survival tactic.
My preoccupation with this virus and its relationship to my own mortality has been muted by the disrupting news out of the Middle East. I am not being shot at or hiding from bombs all the time. I have been sick, but at least I am not in imminent danger of being blown to bits. Southern Ontario is still one of the world’s more stable regions, at least for the moment; it is quiet, secure and some would say dull. Given all the options currently flashing across my social media & news feeds, I’ll stick with dull for now. While we have growing homelessness and stubborn inflation, the lights still go on, potable water still flows from our taps and our grocery stores, while overpriced, are still full. The schools are open and I can still get treatment at my local hospital as long as I am able to suspend all judgments while I wait. Local buses run on time; I can still get into Toronto by public transit. My garden is producing tomatoes, onions and kale in great abundance. I am brewing kombucha, pickling cabbage and living on a passable lentil splodge that can’t decide whether it wants to be a soup or a stew and so it tries to be both depending on what leftovers I dump in. And miraculously, I still have work which generates a modest income, at least for this fall.
None of these minor bourgeois comforts make the news go away. The faux accusations, the butchery, the disregard for human life, the lies and the slaughter all continue without pause. Hamas has set the perfect trap; it would appear that the Israelis are about to jump in, with Joe Biden’s blessings and bunker-busting bombs. Many more Palestinian civilians will die, some Israeli soldiers will die and some of Hamas will slither away to fight another day, Biden’s designer bombs notwithstanding. Or maybe not? I would love to be wrong. A demonstrator’s poster I saw today read: “Immediate Cease-Fire Now — Systemic Change Now”. Double delusion; neither is even remotely on offer. Recovery will take a very long time…
Your sharing is appreciated yet again.