A few days ago, Adam Schlesinger died from complications of the coronavirus. I'm not exactly sure why his death, amongst all the others, startled me so much. I'd forgotten all about his band, Fountains of Wayne, until learning of his passing, and couldn't even whistle one of their tunes. Perhaps it was because Schlesinger was 52, which is close (enough) to my own age? Perhaps it was just a culmination of the mounting death toll? I'm not sure, but it seemed to drive home the reality that this virus can not only infect, but kill. It cares not of class, race, religion, nationality, or age.
We so often go through this life in denial of its end. In fact, even upon facing the reality of death, we don't quite fully acknowledge it. Think of attending a funeral, and how often terms are used such as "passed on," or "in a better place," or "looking down on us." Every idiom is used except for the ones that would clearly denote what has occurred. And, for those of us of a certain age, while we acknowledge our bodies as they change, undergoing natural deterioration from age, gravity and the general wear and tear of existence, we still don't like to dwell upon the inevitable. Count me among those folks.
It is then that something like a pandemic becomes the great equalizer. We can take precautions against it (wearing masks, practicing social distancing, staying home as much as possible), but it is still out there, like a Great White Shark, swimming constantly, looking for its next victim. While an actuary will be able to ascertain the likelihood of our deaths, based on all sorts of demographic data, something like COVID-19 turns all of that askew. Suddenly, the chances of us getting sick and dying -- at any age -- increases. The possibility of living to see another Halloween, another birthday, another New Year, becomes a bit more unsure.
Of course, our lives are fairly precarious to begin with. Coronavirus has just laid bare that reality. We're all going to die. Whenever that typically gets mentioned, many people will hastily nod their head in a sort of 'Yes, yes, I know' response that shows irritation at being reminded of something that, while obvious, they'd done a pretty good job of pushing away the thought of. But it can happen at any time. A fall down the stairs, a car, plane, or helicopter accident, cancer, heart disease, murder -- it's all out there, waiting for us.
Earlier this week, I heard of an elderly COVID-19 patient who looked to be on the mend. Someone wrote on social media that they weren't surprised. "He's tough," they remarked. I loathe that sort of commentary. Built into such distinctions are the unspoken opinions that anyone who doesn't survive coronavirus -- or any illness for that matter -- isn't tough. That is not, of course, true at all. Some people are just more fortunate than others. But everyone -- tough or not -- loses the fight at some point. Ultimately, death comes as the end. We're just never sure when that end will be.
If nothing else, living in the age of the coronavirus has made us acutely more aware of that.
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