Five Short Answers to Way More Than Five Long Questions: COVID-19 Edition

Do not evict roommates or tenants due to coronavirus fears. Find another way.

Do not call the police – that includes the 311 non-emergency line – on neighbors who you think are insufficiently socially distancing. I don’t care what ordinances your city put in place, if you don’t know quite how to have a conversation with somebody, why do you think someone with a gun and the power to arrest/fine/do indiscriminate violence to them is going to be better at it? If you don’t know your neighbors, there will never be a better time to get to know them. Maybe they could use garbage bags or cookies or fabric softener the next time you go to the store.

That confusing guy from college was probably going to remain confusing and never be your boyfriend, but it’s okay to feel a lot of feelings about having your semester cancelled and never being able to find out for sure where things could go. It’s okay to grieve, it’s okay to still nurse unsuitable crushes, and it’s understandable while all the feelings about everything would get wrapped up in this person. This too will pass. 

To the overwhelmed health care workers writing to me about stress, anxiety, and how to manage teams that don’t have enough of anything: I am so sorry. I am honored that you thought of me and I wish I knew something smart and useful to tell you. I think: Trust your training. Feel your feelings. Be honest with your team and with your patients. Be incredibly gentle with yourself. Find and use whatever small rituals, pleasures, and caring acts that keep you grounded. You are doing the best you can.This isn’t happening because you are too neurodivergent, too introverted, too awkward, not good enough at team-building or morale-boosting, or because you can’t think of the right words at the right time. I’m going to raise all the hell I can to get you what you need (while also staying home). 

I am as scared of dying and of losing people as anyone. But what’s more terrifying to me than any illness is watching people with money and power make selfish, cruel decisions and try to displace their fears onto those they see as disposable. Ask yourself, “who do I want to be, now, and when this is over?” This is the time to engage in mutual aid with our neighbors and  fight eugenics, fascism, xenophobia, and cruelty with the same attention we use to scrub our hands of viruses.