[840] Corona Made Me Do It

I don't know what to say.

How long have we lived in the 24-hour “news” cycle with everything “the war on” and “breaking” from Justin Bieber entering the country to how so-and-so “slammed” and “eviscerated” so-and-so with their legendary commentary?

How long have we had to study the various eras in how civilizations thrived or fell?

How long have we known that we've lived beyond our means, in selfish isolation, screaming “fuck the world” with all of the jaded wisdom of every teenager?

How tired have we been? How fat have we gotten? How many “School of Life” videos and existential memes have been shared?

How many times has “Get out the vote!” been parroted? How many silent wishes for death upon generations of those not as “with it?”

First, I was indifferent to the coronavirus. Then, I went to Wal-Mart and felt the low key panic of people's shifty eyes and odd choices on what to stock up on. I'm not panic buying, but I wanted to make it a couple weeks for if and when the shit really starts hitting the fan.

Next, I'm a touch curious about 1 out of every 50 articles that pop up about it. The prevailing theme is that we're, obviously, unprepared, defiant, and going to make things incredibly worse before they get better.

Then, I want to exploit the crisis. I email my investment guy. I tell every single person I can find in the office, now is the time to lobby for work-from-home and more money. I'm energized to do a little more land walking and mapping, because space away might cost a premium.

Now, I'm “generally angry,” that for all of the hullabaloo, for all of the cries about how things should go or the ways people are “stepping up” in a crisis, it all feels like bullshit. I subscribed to some “we'll get through this!” groups for central Indiana where pleas to find ways to get food, rent, or even cars towed stream in.

FUCK. ALL. OF. YOU.

As we speak, the neoliberal mess of Joe Biden wins Florida by a landslide. The narrative on Trump's response is morphing from his general perpetual lies to the handful of reactive and scared shitless plays he's making to appease anyone and anything that resemble “the market” or “his base.” The edifice, even while crumbling, is dedicated to the shine. The mouth pieces stoke the fear. The half-truth minute by minute scare pieces flood in. Catch-phrases repeated, finger waving the moral turpitude, and self-promotion acts of solidarity abound.

We've lost even the capacity to recognize it as an act. We used to have location-based relationships, or short and incidental ones. We might've built “professional” verses “personal.” A “brand” was something independent of the things you did in service to making it profitable. Now it's just this all the time everywhere. Wait until you hear someone a little quicker on the take say it or do it first, shop it around. Don't create or plan in service to the genuine betterment of something, “make a statement” and tell people to follow a dead link and flooded, incorrect, phone number.

This is how it ends. Probably not with coronavirus, but with this sheer inability to ever recognize the real again, even as death stares you in the face. Trump is death, and we voted for him. So was Sarah Palin. So were the celebrities and lobbyist narratives and daily capitulations we made in service to keeping our own heads above the shallow waters we were still allowed to swim in.

What kills me, what floors me to no end, is that for all of my constant and perpetual bitching, I've struggled so fucking hard, not to piece together a house or cope with one meaningless waste of my time after another in trying to get a little more of my indulgent American dream. No, I've fought and fought and fought to speak as though there is something better to be doing, and you, me, us were not doing it, and even during a fucking crisis, I can't get the conversation, the plan, or the disposition that can treat this shit LIKE WE ALL KNEW IT WAS FUCKING COMING.

I don't feel like I exaggerate when I claim people long for death. I don't think that the emotional burden of the silence is overstated. I don't think the ho-hum, literal fucking shoulder shrug I got today, is less deadly than the deadliest virus. Our minds are poisoned. Our spirits don't bite. When the panic truly sets in, there won't be enough news outlets to cover it. When the ship really starts taking on water, you're gonna feel hungry, starved, from all the bullshit we've been feeding on. There won't be land to swim to as we cramp up and drown.

When we come out the other side with 2 whole extra days of half-paid sick leave, that's when you kill yourself. Don't do it as you lose your job, run out of Hotpockets, or think too hard about how sick your grandma got after you came back from spring break. Do it when you realize it's never getting better, and you don't even know how it could. Do it because you're already dead, and there's nowhere left to go. The virus seems like it's trying to force the issue, but at least it wants to live.