A glimpse of normality

S went and got a coronavirus test.

It’s not that she had symptoms. She’s at least as careful as I am. Probably even more so.

But she last saw her parents last January, before the US knew we had a coronavirus outbreak bearing down on us. She and I went to Europe on a cruise. Life seemed so normal.

But the last time she’d seen her parents she had a strange unsettled feeling like she might never see them again.

Then she came to visit in February with plans to see them the next day, and instead she almost died here. Thank God she didn’t, but still. So she didn’t leave for a few weeks and didn’t go visit her folks so as not to worry them with how hurt she really was.

And then coronavirus broke out. The facility her parents live in keep a tight lid on outside visitors, in light of how senior care centers have been devastated. And we’re thankful for that.

But as the country continues to have no clear leadership, no clear direction, and no consistency in the handling of its coronavirus response… as people still refuse to wear masks and huge swaths of this country are experiencing massive waves of outbreak … S realizes that it’s not getting safer. We aren’t at the point of just managing small flares and contact tracing and quarantining the exposed until we know their status so they can’t infect more people. We aren’t even flattening the curve in a lot of places.

That means care communities for high-risk patients can’t think about “opening up a level.” In that respect, every one of those people who refuse to mask, or refuse to distance, or refuse in short to be part of the solution, are actively blocking her ability to see her mom and dad ever again.

So.

The part of the facility her dad lives in, can be visited with a confirmed negative COVID test, though she could not go into his place or stay with him. (The part her mom lives in, has higher risk patients and thus is even stricter about how many negative tests and when, and confirmed quarantine prior to visit, etc. S coming in from out of state can’t get into that section, any which way. Which is hard, but also they don’t have any cases of COVID there and that’s a blessing.)

So S went and got tested so she could at least get into the grounds see her dad.

The negative result was not a surprise, but it was still a relief.

So that negative test meant she could visit her dad. Could see her mom (through barriers and distance). And since I’m close enough to sleep over, and she knows I’m going nowhere and masking etc, she could come visit me and have dinner and play on the Wii while I was at work.

It was simple and nice and so normal.

God, I miss normal.