No human on planet Earth will remain unaffected by the Pandemic of 2020. It will redefine the world; nothing will remain untouched by it. It has ravaged bodies and will continue to. It will ravage economies, cultures, nations.

Consider the dead:

 Over one-hundred thousand dead as this is written. Hundreds more will be added when we wake up tomorrow to another day of sheltering ourselves from deadly contagion, if we’re the lucky few.  

Consider the dead:

Loved ones cannot hold the hands of the virus stricken. Funerals and cremations arranged remotely. Bodies stacked up and unclaimed, sorted in refrigerated trucks, families weeping individually, alone. Psychologists call this ambiguous loss; the loved one is gone but the village, the tribe cannot send them on their way by celebrating them with public grief. If we gather, the virus sickens or kills the tribe.

Doctors, nurses, technicians and sanitary workers will cry before endless overwhelming death, be stricken with PTSD and some will succumb to the virus they are left defenseless against by those who know better. They alone comfort the dying by placing plastic gloves in living hands, and they are blessed for that.

The dead:

 Each person who dies leaves a network of family, friends, students, teachers, lovers, fans or satisfied customers at the butcher, accounting office, gym or medical practice. Rivulets of grief by the thousands roll downhill and become a flood. Seven hundred people in one day; a 9/11 every four days. Eight-hundred people a day in the Obituary section is a river, a lake, a sea of grief. A thousand weeping families? Two thousand refrigerated bodies?  

An ocean of blood and ice.

The living:

What leader will comfort us? How will we be comforted? Franklin Delano Roosevelt comforted a nation through Depression and war. Ronald Reagan comforted after our hopes and hearts exploded over Cape Canaveral. George W. Bush learned how and comforted us the last time New York did America’s dying for it in the rubble of global jihad. Barack Obama comforted us after the senseless slaughter of babies at Sandy Hook and murders in a black church; amazing grace, how sweet the sound…
 
Who comforts us now? Even those who deny it fear for their lives. Our health care workers, our front lines have no line of supply; there is no Medical General Patton is moving against this invisible enemy.

We fear death. We fear living. We fear the future. Show us a sign. Show us something. We need a steady hand, but we don’t have one:

 We have a miserable comforter.

We have a man who, for whatever reason, is incapable of showing anything remotely resembling warmth, compassion or humanity. He delivers long-winded speeches, keeps arguing, shakes his head and makes speeches at us but were we in his place…

We’d say more than gee that’s too bad or I’m doing a great job or Fake news or China or We’re not a shipping clerk.

It’s not going to get better, soon. The shit is hitting the fan and there’s more shit behind it. The virus is hitching rides to the heartland in the bodies of the gullible, the innocent, the hardworking, the scheming and the compassionate. It will kill someone’s one mom or dad who thinks “this isn’t so bad.” It will kill someone’s favorite coach. It will kill a mom with three kids. It will kill any of us by feeding on our lungs. It will exploit disaster. It will spread after tornadoes, floods, hurricanes, fires.

The economy will be horrible; more grief will follow. Recession a certainty, at best. The virus will not relent. The least of us will get it the worst, as usual. We’ll be begging for immigrants to come pick our crops, care for our milk cows, slaughter our meat, bury our dead, change our sheets…  

We’re on our own; we’d better stick together at a safe distance. Help each other financially, spiritually, humanly. At the very least, let our lips bring each other relief.

We need not be miserable comforters, even if one was elected as President of the United States.