Sunday, April 5, 2020

Little Things



At certain times of the year, the fan light in the front door provides a display of light that splashes across the floor and the wall.  If I am up when it happens, it always helps lighten my mood.

During this time of Staying Safe at Home, it will be the little things that will help us get through the days.

For us, all appointments have been cancelled and Doug is going out to check the post office, buy needed food as it runs low. 

I cannot forget that this time of self-isolating is a privilege not all have.

The pandemic roaring through the human population is frightening, in part because it is a danger that cannot be seen.  So it feels like a childhood bogey man, lurking around every corner, under every bed.

Some people ignore it, sometimes because they have no choice. 

Essential workers are keeping our society going by continuing to go to work.  Everyone is now seeing that it is in large part the low income workers for the most part who are actually essential to the smooth running of North American society.

It is not the billionaires, the superstars, the celebrities.  It is the warehouse worker, the trucker, the grocery store clerks, the cleaners.

And of course, the medical personnel.

Human beings seem to need to have heroes.  It is not enough to honk horns and bang tin pots as a thank you to these people.  We need to start paying them as though they are valuable. 

Because they are.

In the meantime, those of us who can stay home?  We need to do that.  We need to pay attention to what the medical people are saying. 

Some politicians are working to lessen the hardship of an economy that is flattening long before the curve of infection.  Others seem to be rooting in the trough.

I hope everyone sees who is doing what and will vote appropriately at the next election.

2 comments:

Peg Cherre said...

I totally concur-we need to pay all those that we can now see as essential workers a fair, a truly living, wage. While I hope we will do this, here in the States I fear that’s a pipe dream, that we will forget within days, weeks at most, that these people literally kept us alive. Of course what I really mean is that the politicians, the people with the power to make the needed change, will forget. Will the rest of us speak out enough to force the issue???

Katie said...

I agree, Peg. As a country, we are so steeped in living off the backs of the service industry to put money in our pockets. And our morals seem to live in that self-same pocket.