Friendly Fire

 

We talk almost every night, my son and I, usually for two hours or more. Ever since his father, my husband, died a month ago. It’s been a long time since we’ve had this much conversation. Heart connection isn’t easy with the distance between us as it is—nearly two thousand miles as the interstate rolls between the deserts of Arizona and Kentucky. But this nightmare has shown us how much we need each other. We’ve been shattered. The wounds are raw. Our chats are punctuated by frequent silences and the sound of someone’s breath blowing out—a last ditch attempt to avert tears.

This loss has changed everything.

“We got hit by a semi,” I whisper, my voice choking on emotion. “That’s what it feels like. We never saw it coming.” He agrees, and another sigh escapes. He tells me of a local pastor who offered his point of view recently on how he’s never known of anyone who died of covid. The man had chosen the wrong moment to sound ignorant. A few sentences later, he realizes his error, hopefully a bit wiser for the discovery.

“I know,” I say, strangely conflicted by the account. Though I deactivated my Facebook account several months ago, last week I went back in to see if there were any messages of sympathy from friends that I might want to respond to. There may have been some four weeks ago, but if so I couldn’t find any. Instead, I found my feed strangled by posts I once subscribed to from the suspicious side of the novel virus fence. I don't stand there anymore—not that I have switched loyalties. Rather, I have experienced both sides of the covid issue and have reached this conclusion:

I no longer care who’s right and who’s wrong.

I don’t believe I was entirely incorrect about my point of view for the majority of 2020. Nor do I believe I was entirely right, as I once did. What I have learned in the last two months is that no one—not even doctors and researchers—have a definitive answer as to how the virus is contracted or why some survive while others perish. And because no one knows that most basic of facts, no one on social media or network media or printed media or even sidewalk preachers have any right to deny its danger or point fingers at those of us who have contracted this mysterious illness. They are not qualified to have an opinion.

Believe me, they don’t want to be. Because the only way you’re qualified to have an opinion is if you’ve watched someone you desperately love suffer and die from complications of covid.

So, here’s my opinion, since I qualify. Sprinkled with a few facts.

It has become a divisive topic that generates a lot of money for every kind of media outlet. Covid was politicized by opportunists in an election year and because of that I will probably never vote again. It is a heart wrenching arena where exhausted nurses cry with sobbing family members who must tell their loved ones goodbye too soon. As a result of overwork and stress, nurses are quitting to look for some other way of making a living. I know—they told me themselves while I was hospitalized.

But most of all, covid is a topic that has been foolishly debated on the cowardly platform of Facebook and Parler and other internet sites. Bows drawn on both sides of the topic are cruelly aimed at innocent bystanders and opponents alike. People feel protected launching their arrows from the supposed safety of their personalized platforms, taking no thought as to whose heart it will penetrate, caring only that they make their point even though no one is listening.

I searched for sympathy on my silenced Facebook page and instead read the following meme as it scrolled by. “Those of you who have remained hidden in your homes for the last year out of fear have wasted a year of your life.” And I wept. If Rob and I had done that, maybe my darling would still be alive.

Covid is the enemy. I believe that. But it has some surprising allies. Our careless words, whether written or spoken, make it clear this virus is not the only thing creating casualties.

That’s just my qualified opinion.