Saint Sebastian Interceding for the Plague Stricken, Josse Lieferinxe (–1508), between 1497 and 1499
Hunker down,
avoid others like The Plague,
the only cure we know so far
involves just staying away.
Talk's cheap.
Life's dear.
Nobody's immune to this damned virus,
no matter what you hear.

Pandemics bring out the crazies, the gullible babies desperately seeking protection. We hear of people too similar to us falling to the infection and understandably get to feeling itchy about its presence. Someone we trust appears to reassure us. We might come to firmly believe that those who fall ill are receiving some sort of payback, retribution for some critical shortcoming. Our news feeds reinforce our previously underlying prejudices, whatever they are, for we seem to run in herds now. If someone insists that only others contract the disease, we breathe a little easier, and might even continue to physically mingle regardless of the governor's latest directive. A pastor, a self-serving politician, a studied pitchman, an old family friend, credentials stemming more from familiarity than from any specific qualification, voices we trust seem to especially empower us. We want to believe, and so we too easily do believe. We hear salvation rumbling through our grapevine and feel protected when we're not.

Whenever chance rules, humans seem to create explanatory stories. Years ago, I was exposed to a workshop exercise that I thought I recognized. I confided to my teammates that I knew the trick behind it, and they elected me their leader. In the first round of play, I led my team to defeat with my superior understanding. Same story on the second round. My team dismissed me as their leader before the third round began. I never came to understand how that exercise actually worked, perhaps because my presumed superior understanding stood in the way of any possible learning. I'd imprinted on my characterization and could not find any way to see beyond it. I believed myself immune to failure even after quite evidently failing. I don't suppose this experience renders me in any way special.

Lucky underpants have not yet been shown to be effective prophylaxis against Covid-19, though I feel reasonably certain that somebody's still selling them somewhere on the internet, and I feel just as certain that somebody's buying and wearing them, too. This is what people do. We think especially stupid those who do fall for these scams, but there's sadly nothing especially stupid about even the least of them.They're perhaps just all too human, just like most of the rest of us. They might represent the most faithful, who, feeling their faith threatened, too easily swallow some rubber worm without fact-checking to determine whether a nasty hook lies within it. Talk's cheap and echoes broadly. Family and friends might seek to reassure me but lead me astray instead. I drink my body weight in turmeric tea, believing I'm boosting my imagined immunity, washing that down with ladlefuls of rustic bone broth, believing I'm reinforcing my resilience. I heard that some fish tank cleaner is supposed to protect me. HeardImmunity.

Nobody can see, hear, taste, smell, or even feel this potentially deadly virus' presence. It plays Blind Man's Bluff for keeps. I heard that loss of the senses of taste and smell might even be one tell that one's contracted it, though it does not follow that as long as I believe my senses intact, I've proven somehow immune so far. We cannot just get in our car and drive to a handy neighborhood testing station to learn if we're 'it.' Most of us cannot qualify to get tested, so we're understandably wary, listening for clues, hoping for cures. Our good old common sense sorts the various claims, choosing which seem most credible. With no way to test even the least believable claims, we have nobody to blame but ourselves when we swallow a more believable one or two. In a world suddenly ruled by a capricious god, any reassuring word receives a warm welcome, providing HeardImmunity while protecting against nothing at all.

In recent days, those who earlier downplayed this pandemic's seriousness have been relenting, admitting their earlier errors, though not usually as publicly as their earlier assertions aired. The preacher who pacified his flock with what turned out to have been absolute schlock could not cure what so many received as and faithfully believed to have been HeardImmunity. The governor who encouraged citizens to flaunt epidemiological history produced a reverberating HeardImmunity, worse than useless in deflecting the pandemic's course, useful instead in furthering its intrusion. The man who swallowed the fish tank cleaner died in spite of his HeardImmunity.

Hunker down,
avoid others like The Plague,
the only cure we know so far
involves just staying away.
Talk's cheap.
Life's dear.
Nobody's immune to this damned virus,
no matter what you hear.

©2020 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #WhatNow?, #PureSchmaltz