May 26: Masks

I saw the headline tonight on one of the news shows I watched commenting on how wearing masks in the time of COVID-19 has become a political football. In other words, there are people out in the world deciding on their own, or perhaps guided into making their decisions based on the nonsensical pronouncements of a woefully unqualified leader, that wearing a mask in the effort to slow the spread of the virus and protect others in the population is an indication of your political beliefs. 

My sister is a doctor of pharmacy working in a rural hospital. My cousin is the VHA National Infectious Diseases Clinical Pharmacy Program Manager, a title so long I had to actually copy and paste it from one of the many websites featuring her credentials, just to be sure I got it right. There are, at minimum, four others in my family I can think of working in environments that could be putting them at physical risk while this is going on. 

When the pandemic began in earnest, my sister, who also likes to sew along with knowing more about medicine than most of us have ever known about anything, made a mask for me. Actually, she's probably made hundreds of them by now, but I think I probably got one from the first batch. I'm fully aware that the protection wearing a mask offers me is minimal at best. I'm also aware how my wearing a mask offers more protection to others from the virus I could potentially, and unknowingly, be carrying. I'm fine with that. Actually, I'd rather be able to walk around in an impenetrable bubble to be completely safe myself, but I'll take the minimal protection they offer. The way I see it, if my wearing a mask could, in any remotely possible way, keep any of the people in my family who are working to protect the rest of us from the virus a little more safe at their jobs, it's a small sacrifice to make. 

It's kind of hot. It's flannel, so it's a little scratchy. I'll wear it while I'm out walking the dog, which is nearly the only time I leave my yard and could encounter any other people. I'm usually the only person I see on our walks wearing a mask. I don't care. Luckily most of the people I briefly encounter are a good distance away already, and just say hello and go on their merry ways. Sometimes I'll get looks or second glances that seem paired with some silent judgement, but that's fine. Maybe they'll come around someday. Hopefully they won't be forced to by a second wave in weeks or months that proves so much worse than what we've seen so far. As long as I don't need to listen to any of the self-righteous diatribes they've crafted after all the one-sided media they've digested, or the passive-aggressive and condescending speeches they'd like to share in an effort to educate me on how misguided and paranoid I'm being, I figure, live and let live. 

Because whether they realize it or not (and I'd argue they often don't), live and let live is very much a cooperative endeavor right now.