Saturday was a hallmark in Times of Coronavirus. For the first time in 50 days, people were allowed to go out for a walk (in shifts). And everyone did. Even people who had never walked very much before the quarantine left their homes and strolled around to look at everyone else walking. They wanted to see who was obeying the rules, and who was not. Perhaps they also wanted their neighbors to see that they had survived and were still alive.
The streets were literally flooded with people. Although some observed social distancing, many did not. The weather was warm and sunny. It seemed to be a sign from the heavens that the plague was over. The only thing missing was a dove with an olive branch.
For those people living in coastal areas, the beaches were open though only for professional surfers. However, that was no obstacle. In a valiant effort to act the part, non-surfers took their ironing boards to the beach to shoot (or iron out) the curl.
Not that ironing boards resemble surfboards all that much, but for law enforcement, the fit was good enough. My youngest son, the policeman, told me that the police have all but thrown in the towel. They only go after the very obvious offenders because it is impossible to control so many people suffering from acute quarantine fatigue.
The illusion of divine benevolence also continued into Sunday. Good weather has that effect, and Sunday was again a beautiful day. Everybody went out again to rejoice, and, once again, nothing happened. No coronavirus lightning bolt came out of the sky to fulminate those who had dared to emerge from confinement.
The only fly in the ointment was the fact that two people died while walking/running/bicycling. However, their deaths were due to heart attacks brought on by overdosing on exercise. After so many days of confinement, they should have taken things more slowly.
Even though I am accustomed to walking, I also felt the strain of exercising again after so long. Before March, when I was able to go to the university to teach, I used to walk to work each day. Walking is something that I do quite well because throughout my life in Spain, it has been my main mode of transportation.
I do not have a driver’s license because in Europe, I have never needed one. In Europe, there is good public transportation. In the USA, good public transportation only exists in DisneyWorld. Everyone in the USA needs a car. So, when I was a teenager in Miami, I had a driver’s license. However, driving was not something that I did well at all.
In the 1960s, my older brother owned a GTO muscle car, which, in a weak moment, he let me drive. (I cannot remember why.) When backing out of the garage, I scraped the left side of the car against the garage door.
The ghastly mark remained on the car until my brother sold it some years later. It was a doleful reminder of my utter lack of driving skill. My sister still claims that the year that I drove us both to school was the most dangerous year of her life. So moving to Spain doubtlessly contributed to my longevity.
In Spain, the general de-escalation euphoria is also reflected in the government’s daily press conferences, especially now that the news is much better. Yesterday the Minister of Health literally bubbled over the improvement in the statistics. He dwelled on how low the death rate and contagion figures were. He delighted in telling us that yesterday ‘only’ 164 people died.
His discourse reinforces the belief that the virus is a thing of the past, and that we are at the dawn of a new post-coronavirus era. It is true that 164 is certainly a more favorable number (especially if we compare it to last month when there were 961 deaths in one day). Everything is relative. After 50 days of quarantine, we have become inured to the presence of the Grim Reaper,
I went out on my balcony and looked down. In the area in front of my building, I tried to imagine 164 corpses lying there on the ground. At the very least, the bodies would have invaded Avenida Cervantes, interrupted traffic, and stretched to the sidewalk on the other side of the street. Maybe if that had indeed happened, the number would have seemed more real. The number would have been more than just a number.
Each of these 164 bodies used to be a person with hopes, goals, and dreams. Each had a favorite food, armchair, and perhaps a pet dog or cat. Maybe they were saving up to buy a new car, or had planned to go to the beach this summer. Most had families who loved them, and who mourn their loss. So many people have died in the last three months that now the dead have ceased to be people.
My son, the psychiatrist, also went out walking this weekend. He tries to keep a low profile since he does not want any of his neighbors to know that he works at a hospital. He prefers for them to think that he is some sort of shady character who comes and goes at strange hours of the day and night. No one sends hate messages to drug dealers, only to healthcare workers.
I asked him if the nightmare was truly over. He said that he did not think so, and that all of the people who are now metaphorically dancing in the streets should be more afraid. They should be more careful about social distancing.
Perhaps they are so carefree because they have never seen the virus like he has. He told me that the longer that the virus stays with us, the easier it will be for it to mutate.
In his three months of intensive care, my son observed that Covid-19 was able to diversify as well as Amazon, who started out selling books and now sells everything from kitchen cabinets to inflatable mermaids. Like Amazon, the coronavirus also knows how to diversify.
Over a period of three months, Covid-19 began killing people in one way, and ended up killing in them in quite another. It started out specializing in pneumonia and then graduated to massive blood clotting. So, instead of choking to death, people died from strokes and heart attacks. Even during that short time, the virus adapted in order to be able kill its victims more efficiently.
When I mentioned that the numbers were lower, he said, of course, they were. The most vulnerable sector of the population has now been skimmed off along with thousands of others, who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. But the virus has not gone away (otherwise, people would not continue to be infected). Even though it seems to be lying low, it could be merely taking a rest to think about how it can mutate so as to better infect and kill those of us who are left.
This also seems to be the opinion of Dr. Fernando Simón (Spain’s Dr. Fauci). It is not a question of whether the virus will peak again, but rather of when it will peak again. It is to be hoped that the next time, we will be better prepared.
