Whether "for the children" or "for the parents" there is no compelling reason or rationalization for mixing households during this holiday season!
Twenty Christmases ago, my mother had suffered a heart-attack on the Sunday after Thanksgiving and was in her her fourth week of treatment. Since she was weak and could not be left alone, her doctors moved her to a sub-acute care unit for the holidays.
It was a very difficult time for everyone, most especially my mother. My niece had decorated her room (as best she could) in an effort to encourage festiveness, but since mother was a cardiac patient, my sister and I had to be very strict about access to her room; no one could approach the bed without first scrubbing up (and doing it correctly). We also (at her urging) tried to discourage an abundance of visitors in general. Not only was she feeling less than sociable, the whole process was exhausting for her as one might expect. On top of it, she had only just become a widow herself ten-weeks earlier, after forty-years of marriage. This was hardly the atmosphere for promoting a merry Christmas.
It is tempting, in retrospect, to speculate if we did the right thing. As fate worked out, my mother died one month after Christmas, so limiting access and guarding her health could be construed as a waste of time and a lost opportunity. Should we have thrown open the doors and allowed well-wishers to pour in against her wishes and our best instincts? There were certainly many who thought so (and expressed as much) after she was gone, not quite with recrimination so much as incredulity that we had either been too alarmist or not alarmist enough. People are very free with their opinions after the fact.
Personally, I didn't care about those opinions then and I care less about them now. Commonsense and common science dictate that you do not let throngs of people from all over the country pour into an enclosed room at the height of flu season with a cardiac patient. Encouraging anything else would have been tantamount to manslaughter.
I bring this up because, while perusing social media these past few weeks, I have become alarmed and appalled by what I've been reading; people justifying cross-country travel and mixed household celebrations for any number of questionable reasons and dubious motives. And lest you think this is merely a phenomenon of"deniers" please be assured, it is not. And to be fair, I am less incensed with"deniers" who are at least following a moral compass (rightly or wrongly) then from the outright virtue signaling hypocrites. Over the past few weeks, I have seen people who have hitherto shamed others into mask-wearing, pleaded for prayers for sick family members, criticized a lack of action from the federal government, derided the president and certain governors for their lax attitudes, and have now packed-up and gone on a "happy holiday" tour, or are hosting a"small holiday" get-together, or are encouraging "don't be alone for the holidays" open-houses (with hand sanitizer provided-- of course), all in direct contradiction to commonsense and any and all health recommendations.
There are many reason why this could be happening. One is what the CDC worried about at the very beginning of this pandemic when they debated suggesting the wearing of masks or not and even discouraged it at first; this being the fear that people would view masks as a panacea for reckless behavior. Let's all be clear here (for as many times as there are dollars in the U.S. national debt) masks are a fail-safe for essential errands; they help you contain potential infection of others by being in close proximity to you. They do not protect you; and they are only moderately effective in protecting others. As such, they are only recommended for use in limited situations, like shopping for groceries where it is next to impossible to stay six-feet away from everyone, nor not touch anything.
Despite what we may want to believe, there is nothing "essential" about Christmas shopping. Nor is there anything "essential" about spending Christmas with anyone other than your household. There are many people breathing out their last alone this Christmas season who would probably love to see their families again, but of course, they cannot; because they were infected by a virus spread in some manner or another by someone else. Cruel? Perhaps; but reality is cruel; get over it!
I also understand the guilt and false patriotism factors. My mother was a mistress of guilt in the first-order; fortunately (from overexposure) I quickly grew immune to its effects. I don't govern my actions from guilt; I govern my actions from what I think is ethical and right. Herein lies the conundrum I have been seeing for weeks now; the ethical relativism where people profess to want to comply with what is ethically right; that is until it goes against something they want to do, or that someone else wants them to do. Just because a parent pressures a child (or a child pressures a parent) or a boyfriend pressures a girlfriend (or a girlfriend pressures a boyfriend) to visit for a holiday, does not make that ethically right. People need to ask themselves, how will I feel two weeks hence if me (or my hosts) are critically ill or worse? How will I feel when I am the witting (or unwitting) contributor to the next spike or the next mutation?
Here in Puerto Rico, over 90% of our current cases have been tracked down to a handful of visitors from Orange County, Florida. Its easy to do this on an island that has had access limitations and contact tracing mechanisms in place for months now; it is not so easy on the mainland where people can drive interstate willy-nilly to their heart's whim or desire's content.
The simple fact of the matter is this: the only way to contain a virus is to break the chain of infection. Each of us have to ask ourselves, do we want to return to normal, or do we want to be going through this all over again next Christmas? Do we want to get on with our lives, or do we just want to keep kicking a can down the road, waiting for someone else to save us from ourselves, be that medical professionals, politicians, or pharmaceutical companies? Obviously, our behavior is sending mixed messages. Our wanton disregarding for sheltering in place and limiting exposure infers that we want to return to normal lives, but alas, this very action is the greatest impediment we have to achieving our desired goal.
So give a great gift to your loved ones this holiday season and stay home. Tell your loved ones that you are doing so not only because you love them, but because you love humanity, and yearn for a time when we can all be together again in a happier place. I can think of no greater gift than the gift of loving your fellow man, and showing that love through altruism versus selfishness, no matter how rationalized the virtue or misplaced the sentiment.
Comments