Like you, I have heard many news broadcasts on Covid 19 which all provide some information or update on the state of the illness, its effect and things we can do to protect our families and ourselves. Most of them are simple. Wash your hands, avoid crowds and use social distancing. These are each very simple things which do not require much energy, but demand attention to where we are and what we do. Be conscious about your routine. I was thinking about how we have to be focused on the things we never paid attention to before like not shaking hands, avoid sitting next to strangers in public places and remembering to clean off the shopping cart before we use it in the grocery store. All of a sudden, we have to be deliberate about what used to be no big deal. We know there have always been people who did not wash their hands or had an odor about them as we share a bus or subway ride but we did not fear them. Now we have to be conscious about the world around us.
Then I thought shouldn’t we always have been aware of the world around us. Haven’t we always been responsible for watching out for one another. Our concerns for our family and our neighbor and for people of the world we live in should have always been something we are conscious of. I saw protestors driving in circles the other day who wanted to make a point that the world should get back to business. Then I realized that it was business as usual that made us num, and blind to the world around us. It is the business as usual that made us focus on me and mine rather than you or what is ours. Social distancing makes you realize that we were not built to live this way. Social distancing should not make us anti-social but rather community minded. The change that is coming, that new normal will come from our awareness to do the right thing. Approach others like you may be carrying the virus and do no harm to them. Give space to others out of reverence to another life.
The example of the health care workers to comfort has been the salvation for the sick. The supermarket workers and those who stock the shelves have managed to bring sustenance to customers who they do not even know. The aids and nurses sitting next to our dying family members are the comforters and compassionate ones that we can nor presently be.
Us, we are the ones who still comfort the grieving as we bring their loved ones to the safe place, the resting place where some of our best memories lie. Keep remembering that even though we do not like the sadness and death that we deal with daily, we are assisting those who must bury their dead and then learn a new way of living and coping, carrying on. We have always had the responsibility to assist the dying and the grieving and hopefully someone will be there for us when the time comes. Hopefully it will not be business as usual but rather business as it should be. Be present, and aware and know that we all do holy work in ordinary ways.
