something in the air (COVID-19)

there's
something in the air.

the irony is not lost of me
that as soon as i get
some relative stability
there's a global pandemic,
an outbreak brought by the
emergence of the coronavirus.

but,
as i said in my reply in
an email to my manager following
the cancellation of my shift,

"this whole thing's bigger than any one person."

it's affecting everything.

shit, there's even
coronavirus pornography.
yes, that is a thing,
and one i fairly predicted.

how interesting that upon
initial detection by Li Wenliang,

(may he rest in peace.
self-isolation may not have saved his life,
but he may have saved those of his family.
your courageous example is one to follow;
i too saw it coming...)

he was warned by Wuhan Police
to stop "spreading rumours" about
an illness that resembled SARS on We Chat,

(prophets are often
treated as pariahs
before being sadly
proven right)

(prove me wrong)

because one of the more curious
symptoms of this disease has been
the mass hysteria and spread of misinformation.
the ignorance displayed in
our varying responses is
staggering.

without being dismissive of
the legitimate concerns of the issues involved,

it is an endemic indication of
how utterly clueless and stupefied we are in tackling
the first major, all-encompassing international crisis
since the 2007-08 financial collapse of the economy that
our grand solution to the problem is to
run to the supermarkets and bulk-buy in large
all the immediately available stock of toilet paper.

the slightest flip of a switch
triggers thoughts of
harbingers,
the threat of an impending apocalypse,
and of all the potential threats
they think of
the dangers posed to the rectal orifice,

if God really loves you
he'll let you wipe your arse
with the leaves off of a tree.

it shows us all how truly
insecure we are in our minds,
and how we lack the
autonomy and independence
as a species that we so
desperately crave.

i wake up most mornings
with a slight build-up of gack and phleghm
due to the winter cold and
the previous evening's cigarettes,
so when I'm on the glider
on my way to work
I can't cough beneath my hand,
blow my nose or clear my throat
without people looking at me sideways,
eyeballing and rubbernecking.

the commonplace is now seen as a potential red flag,
normal traits treated as worthy of stigma.

even if it's only
2 or 3 a day,
it's a hard time
to be a smoker.

all of a sudden
people have woken up to
the importance of hygeine.
Howie Mandel's World of Cleanliness
doesn't seem so zany now,
does it?

"If you're happy and you know it
wash your hands!"

In the land of the plague,
the autistic man is king,

always prepared for
these contingencies.

i'm pissed because
my Japanese wrestlings shows in
the month of March
have been cancelled for the foreseeable.

even the monkeys are fighting
over a pot of yoghurt
in a street in Thailand.

i went into the City Centre yesterday
to pick up a pair of black hi-tops that didn't fit me,
and contrary to the usual, tired old quote,
"Belfast is buzzing,"
by comparison, it looking more like
a dead zone.

"This town (town)
is coming like a ghost town."

conversation with a barista
about the lack of trade,
both of us working in
different public places,
waiting for Boris Johnson to
shut the country down,

(Hello, Prime Minister,
how's your Brexit
going?)

if they were really serious about containment
they would have put the place on lockdown
well over a couple of months ago,
barred all incoming from China
(I was handling such things
in a warehouse off the Boucher Road),
but they, like everyone else,
were only thinking about money,
and now it's got to this stage.

even I've had to combat
some of my own prejudices and paranoia.
i have held sneaking suspicions about
the Chinese government for years,
and refuse to visit the country
on the basis of it's animal rights issues,
specifically the barbarous consumption of dog meat,
but this mild form of xenophobia
has been dispelled though
my conviction of their response once
things became clear.

parties attaching themselves
to whatever issue's pressing,
is of interest to the wider public,
political opportunism
hiding behind faces that care
the ulterior motives and
their own particular spin,

i myself am
guilty of this sin.

it might well get to the point that
it is necessary for
a temporary suspension of democracy:

try as i might,
it's hard to deny
that it's impossible to go on
business as usual.

i personally have no fear of this disease.
i'm not worried about me,

(my people survived the Famine.
COVID-19 ain't got got a thing,
and

I'm a writer who
likes to exercise,
goes weeks and months at a time
without heading out;

solitary confinement
means nothing to me.)

i'm as fit as a fiddle,
in the peak of health,
and a good immune system,

(eat clean,
be healthy)

but
i do worry about the elderly,
pregnant women and children,
potentially vulnerable members of our society.

I hear old people argue, undecided
whether it's the hot or cold weather
that spreads the disease, before
settling amicably on the wind.

this thing will pass,
blow over with the breeze,
but it's what's left behind,
the damage in it's wake
we should be concerned
about.

(even as i'm sitting here,
I've got notifications through that
all Scouting related events,
including weekly meetings and projected camp,
are to be cancelled.)

Increasingly I get the feeling
that this disease
has yet to reach it's peak.

i always try to read between the lines,
remain calm and measured
in the face of adversity,
high-intensity situations, emergencies,
keep a level head.

originally i was dismissive,

"I'm sick of hearing about Coronavirus!"
"It's a hullaballoo!"
"Coronavirus, my arse!"
"Watching Coronavirus unfold is like
a really shit game of Pandemic."

But now that it's the real thing,
I'm starting to wonder.

it's certainly not without importance,
major implications for
me and my family.

i have this theory,
not based upon science but instead
one of my strange beliefs,
that moderate exposure to
things bad for you is ultimately good for you.
it strengthens your constitution,
encourages the activity of your antibodies.
with light smoking,
the carbon monoxide being combatted
increases the power of your lungs and their capacity.
i'm never out of breath on a run,
and the chemicals inhaled are
probably that bad that
they fight, counteract
those of the virus.

but that's probably a myth,
a useless coping strategy for anxiety,
and cannot be claimed to be based on
any legitimate truth,
so
don't take my word for it.

i also have this other theory
which i discussed
over the phone with my friend,
that many of us might already be
infected,
but that it's effect is almost
like that of a benign parasite,
most of us being more or less immune,
but that we are simply host-carriers
passing the virus on
to other people.

As my social media accounts,
that ever-reliable source,
font of knowledge
in this day and age
testify, proclaim,
people have gone crazy.

Have they ever thought about
what happens when it all runs out
and that there's the
possibility of food shortages because
everyone hit the panic button?

there's preventive measures
that can be implemented,
but it is almost an inevitability
that in some way
we will all come into contact
with this thing,
a possibility for which
i am resigned.

but, at the end of the day,
life goes on.

eventually,
perhaps by the end of the year,
all of this will be over.

as the World Health Organisation says,
echoing High School Musical,
"we're all in this together."

for the present,
it is our civic duty
to protect those most in danger,
be a little more selfless and a little less selfish,

(you don't need 20 litres lactose-intolerant milk
because of it's longer-lasting shelf life,
those who legitimately require it do,
you greedy hoarder!)

and to
behave responsibly.

(Written by me, on Friday the 13th.)