As far as I know, I have never used this blog to make any substantive comments or implications regarding members of my family. That changes today, and I may never know if it was a good idea or not.
If the date associated with this is not adequate context, the world is in the midst of a global pandemic of a virus called Covid-19. Or, at least that is what I believe. There are many different viewpoints on this subject. My only son, the father of my only grandchild, as far as I can tell, considers this to be far from a serious health crisis. He has at least one regular outside visitor to his house with no discernible attempt to avoid disease transmission between his visitor and the rest of the household. I consider it a safe presumption that this visitor has a similarly lax approach to disease transmission interventions in other aspects of their activities outside of my son's home.
My wife wants a traditional Easter ham dinner. We have been trying for many days to arrange for either delivery or pickup of the ingredients needed to prepare such a dinner, to no avail.
I feel compelled to interject here that I realize that even now people in other regions, and probably some people in my own region, are literally starving, or nearly so, due to food access issues that are a direct result of this pandemic.
With no safer way to acquire the requisite ham, I tried going to purchase one in-person in a store today, but had too late of a start for the now-shortened business hours and access control procedures of local grocery stores. This gave me some time to think, not that I hadn't been already.
How do I quantify my relative risk of going into a grocery store with nothing more than a makeshift face mask, vs. having Easter dinner, as invited, at my son's house? My son has offered to shop for me, but that makes me responsible for his exposure on my behalf, the exposure of others to him on my behalf, and not much safer myself in the end.
To clarify my personal risk: I have advanced congestive heart failure which is barely managed to a survivable degree under the best of circumstances. A simple cold put me in the hospital two years ago, and the treatment I received put me into temporary acute renal failure. The seasonal flu would almost certainly kill me. This new virus would almost beyond any reasonable doubt, kill me. I also have type 2 diabetes, which I think is also a risk factor, but I'm not sure how.
Ethically speaking, my primary concern isn't even regarding my own survival, but more whether I become another vector for this disease to affect others, or another patient drawing resources which could help others with a better chance of survival, and frankly more value to society after the fact than I could ever have.
So why am I even writing this?
Seriously, I can't remember.
I guess this is just my transitory trail of digital breadcrumbs which for all I know could be my last futile grumblings about life.
I have made my decision. If my wife wants to go to my son's house for Easter dinner, I will go and attempt to refrain from any further complaint. I will do all I can to avoid being in close proximity with anyone, especially my granddaughter, but I won't make an issue of it because I know there are too many factors out of my control. If anyone present at this dinner has the virus, ultimately everyone will. What saddens me most is that my son has medical conditions which make him very nearly as at risk of non-survival as I am.
I hope that youth and health will get my granddaughter through this alive.
I don't need to explain the many layers of meaning to the title of this post, do I?
No comments:
Post a Comment