when the desk nurse called him, her answer was a swift and firm, ‘no,’ and when he mentioned that he expected bad news and really needed a family member to be with him, she said, exasperatedly, “who cares?”
i laid awake that night wondering when everything will stop being so damn hard.
sure, these are unprecedented times, and certainly, healthcare isn’t the only thing buckling under the enormous effort of pandemic survival. from schools to businesses to parenting and relationships, weaknesses are being exposed all over the place with frightening impossible-to-ignore consistency — just ask anyone who has finally walked away from their marriage and filed for a ‘pandemic divorce,’ or that mom who loudly used the f-word while trying to help her kid figure out the chat function during my son’s zoom class. we are all just about done.
but it doesn’t mean we are tapped out of compassion, humanity and respect for life, does it? these are dark days, but certainly not so dark that we can’t give those who need care, at the very least, our soft words and a gentle hand.
because when you strip everything else away — policy issues, poor government planning, even the stress of a global pandemic — we are still humans who deserve to be valued. so maybe there isn’t a bed available in the emergency room for an 80-year-old. and perhaps covid protocols mean a young father is left to hear devastating 世界杯决赛2022 alone. at the end of the day, compassion and empathy costs us nothing.
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