Covid Comes Home: A Corona Chronicle

My positive test. I hadn't been feeling good all day but chalked it up to allergies.  On the way home from school, I noticed I had chills--which is not a symptom of allergies!  I took my temperature when I got home and found I had a fever over 100 degrees.  I then took the Covid test and it came back positive almost instantly. 

 From the earliest days of the pandemic in the spring of 2020, I imagined what it would be like to write this entry.  Back then, I wasn't sure that I would ever have to write it and apprehensive about what it might entail.  Eventually, I became certain I'd write this entry and was unfazed by the prospect.  And now it's here.

To be honest it's anticlimactic. 

I finally got Covid. In fact, as of yesterday morning, with  Kai's positive test, our whole family has had it (Barbara and Ezra both got it last month).

Of course we're late to the party.  By this time, almost everyone we know has had Covid.  It's no longer a great shock to hear that someone has the dreaded virus nor does it seem necessary to put the whole prayer chain on high alert.  Frankly, I'm glad that I got it when I did.  The current variant is much less severe, especially for those who are vaccinated and boosted (which I am) and when I got the positive test, there was little doubt in my mind that the ride wouldn't be too bumpy.  And so far my experience with Covid has been mild.

 I tested positive this past Wednesday, September 21 and went into isolation that day. (I've been staying in Ezra's room on the bottom bunk. It was easier to have him move into our bedroom with Barbara because Barbara's back can't take the bunk mattress).  I felt pretty rough  Weds and Thursday.  Friday, I felt better but was fatigued and slept a lot.  Yesterday, I didn't sleep as much and had more energy.  Today, I feel better still.  Tomorrow is my last day of isolation and I expect to feel close to normal by then if the trend continues.  I might even try to mow the lawn tomorrow!   Kai is only into his second day of isolation but I can hear him on the other side of the wall in his room jovially talking on the phone with a friend.  I'm guessing he's going to be fine too.

So what does it all mean?  It's been a little more than a year since I closed out my regular Covid updates.  I predicted then--correctly-- that we had essentially decided to return to normal life and to do our best to live with the virus.  Back then the most contagious variant of the virus--Omicron was not yet on our radar.  Omicron would prove to be the most relentless Covid version yet, one that would shift the goalpost from preventing infection to preventing severe illness and death. By winter of 2021 we had the highest case counts ever seen, and yet. . .life went on for the most part as normal.  There were no mass shut-downs, no social distancing mandates, and masks remained optional.  By summer of 2022, my biggest fear was not of getting Covid, but of getting Covid at the wrong time. I had a string of trips lined up and I didn't want any of my plans upended by an inconveniently timed positive test.   I managed to dodge the virus all summer.  While colleagues and students were felled just before the 8th grade class trip, I made it to and from Hawaii untouched.  A cancelled flight caused me to arrive in Jordan several days late, just in time the miss the virus's passage through our dig team, infecting four along the way.  I made it to Florida, including an anniversary trip to Miami without incident.  And though I did get sick after that trip, multiple tests insisted it wasn't Covid. And finally, I was able to make a quick trip out West about a week ago.  I think it was on the flight home from that trip that Covid finally caught up with me. 

Covid isn't quite "just like the flu" yet.  According to a recent article in The Atlantic, Covid is projected to continue to kill about 100,000 Americans annually for some time to come. That's three times the typical annual death count from flu.  Yet it's hard to even say where we are currently with case counts and such.  The New York Times still includes the maps and data in it's now-occasional Virus Briefings, though the link isn't provided in each briefing like it was before.  Todays numbers show the spread of the virus has been flat throughout the summer--neither low nor high--but just consistently the same, and has recently even begun to decline.  Of course with so many tests being done at home and thus not reported (ours among them), it's no longer certain how accurate those case counts even are.   We know people continue to sicken and die from Covid, but at a pace our hospitals seem to be able to manage.  Recently hospitalizations have been declining, which is encouraging, though over 400  Americans on average continue to die daily from Covid.  It's really worth taking a deep dive into the most recent NYT data. The good news according to this data is that by every metric we are doing better than we were a year ago.

I've heard some say that we mustn't get complacent.  This virus is still serious! And I don't suppose they're wrong. After all some of the more vulnerable in my life--my mother and mother-in-law for example--have managed to evade infection so far, and I want that to continue!  But I'm just not sure what vigilance looks like at this point?  Are the disruptive measures--the school and business shut downs--worth the good they might achieve?  Wouldn't avoiding crowds and masking every time we go out have be permanent parts of our lives now?  And is that how we want to live?  And would any of these measures even work given how infectious the current variants have proven to be?

This is what I'd like to see--and how I plan to live going forward:  

• Vaccines and the annual or so booster continue to be our primary weapon of defense against severe Covid.  In a few months, when my immunity is likely starting to wane, I'll pick up the  latest booster and probably throw in a flu shot as well.
•   I'd love to see masking when feeling sick normalized.  If I've got the sniffles or maybe a mild sore throat, I'll put on a mask to protect those around me from whatever I might have--Covid or not. 
•  I'd like to see people really commit to staying home when they don't feel good instead of toughing it out.  I know that can be difficult, especially when you apply that stricter standard to your kids too and you have limited sick days at work.  But we can at least be more intentional in this regard.

I predict that Covid will continue to evolve as a more contagious but less virulent disease.  I know it's possible that it could take an ugly turn, but I think that's unlikely.  I do suspect that at some point a new contagion will arise and unfortunately, I predict we will be no better prepared for that outbreak than we were for this one.  It's just not in our character to do the disciplined work required to keep these viruses at bay.

Now that Covid has come home to our family, I doubt there will be much left to say about this virus that hasn't already been said.  I hope that's the case any way.  We will see.