I knew in January that something was up. The language being used in material surrounding COVID-19 was new. Even the jokes about the virus had a context that suggested something different was about to happen. Given this era we are now in where lying is a daily reality, I'm slowly teaching myself to listen for clues or tells. My wife and I discussed the potential risks we faced in a planned trip the first week of February. I am so deeply thankful we made that trip, more so every day as the world burns down around us.
So, as pandemics tend to go, the very best and the very worst of people step into the light. America, unfortunately, has little experience in dealing with "third world issues". That "China Disease" doesn't stand a chance in our highly-civilized, fast-food-fueled, American society. If Ebola or SARS or MERS taught us anything, it's that when a viral killer shows up in America, it will kill a handful of people and then someone (I guess it's Jesus?) intervenes and it goes away. Thankfully, some people in the Obama Administration (probably Atheists) understood how close we were to moving Max Brooks from fiction to reference material. As people die, we discover, you are only as powerful as the spitefulness with which you dismantle your predecessors task forces.
As death tolls rise, and cities begin to issue "stay at home" mandates, my employer prepares to respond. In a span of two weeks, what was a 10% work-from-home employee base swells to a 90% work-from-home employee base. One of my employees is high-risk and is a courier, so my first response was that I had to take him off the road. It was about that time the phrasing emerged, "essential employee", next year's top candidate for inclusion by Webster. That brave, dedicated person saving your life; that person serving you fast-food-fuel; and yours truly - printing checks for America are the essentials this new reality will throw ticker-tape parades for, via live stream from a broken and deserted town near you.
All of those people out there who think this is being handled, "perfectly" - there is no bottom to the depth of your inhumanity. Please, please tell me how the greatest nation on Earth is less equipped than South Korea to respond; or is less responsive to an impending crisis than most every other nation save a few? Why, after 1918, or Hurricane Sandy, or Hurricane Katrina, or the California Wildfires, or <insert name of disaster> has our response to sit on our hands and hope "the God" is a merciful god this year? I understand that preparation costs money, but negligence carries a price tag 10 x as high and comes with tragic loss of life. It's inexcusable that technology, and medicine, and research must have profit-motives, and right to life, and quality of life are best left to the philanthropists. We are watching every single day, our leader, devalue human life and make it the roadblock to economic success. "... then go ahead and die and decrease the surplus population!" All the while, we demonstrate to the despots of the world, just how prepared America is to deal with germ warfare.
Back in my world, my staff, quite on cue, blow me up constantly with every "end of the world" headline they can find. Are they scared? Maybe. Are they angry? Seemingly so. Once the office went dark, and we were the only lights on in a deserted building... I turned into a representation of the entity that was going to kill them and everyone they ever knew and loved. What a great feeling, because I'm not human or experiencing all of the same feelings they are, right? The Employer holds a teleconference with all of us "essential employees", and we all watch the VP broadcasting from the toilet paper fort he built in the dining room of his house, and for an hour he provides no encouragement, no incentives (save a corona lunch ordered in for the staff every Wednesday), no answers or horizons. It was absolutely fucking pointless and inflamed and already raging staff. Our feedback as supervisors was immediate, and within a day, hourly staff were given a $2/hour increase for the period of about two months. The supervisors who have had to manage all of this; doing right for their staff and advocating for them; navigating clients and payroll specialists and supervisors as we journey into uncharted waters; while facing all of the same risks... you can go fuck yourselves. Some of us dared to question this decision, and those who did, got wrath and threats. Our employer; who I want to call out so badly for this betrayal; has broke my spirit. The fog in my head is now mixed with anger and hurt... my faith in my employer is crushed, and I no longer trust that you care what happens to me.
Keep moving forward. Regardless of how I feel about my employer, there are people all over The South relying on me and my staff to keep printing payroll and getting them out to clients. I take pride in that. I am not saving lives, I am not in an environment making minimum wage and serving the public, but I am keeping someone fed and housed and supporting themselves and maybe supporting others. But I am growing tired... the noise in my head is thick, it won't allow me to relax, but every day it becomes denser. This is my day:
- "New Orleans is the leader of the world in COVID-19 growth"
- Go To Work
- Staff feeds each other's paranoia for 8 hours
- Wonder if we have enough groceries or supplies to get thru another day
- Maybe go to the store and find 1 of the 12 things I need
- Go home
- "Number of new cases doubled today"
- Take whatever I have to induce sleep
- Repeat
Yesterday, in the day-to-day syndrome, one of my staff allowed her peers to stoke her fears and trigger her anxieties to the point where she felt she needed to go get tested on her way home. She had no fever, so who knows how she managed to do that, and of course she was told to self-quarantine. Wonderful. In all of the years I've been in New Orleans with this staff, I have never been so fucking angry at them. I could barely talk this morning, and all I wanted to do was scream. I didn't... so that too is now in my head. All of that rage penned up in my skull. So, now I am short-handed and handling a crisis.
In that aforementioned lack of trust I now have in my employer - I am convinced that they could use this pandemic to close our center (for good) and have found a way to do so that eliminated a severance package, a stay bonus, and paying all of our vacation time. Maybe it's paranoia brought on by stress or fog - but I simply don't trust my company to do the right thing any more. My employee self-isolating is one nail shy of finishing that coffin. If she tests positive, or any of the rest of us have to do the same - in goes the final nail. If I weren't so exhausted, I'd be freaked out right now.
I keep reminding myself how fortunate I am to have a job to go to today. I am still bringing home money, so is my wife, and I recognize how lucky we are in that regard. Maybe my employer thinks I don't realize this and I am taking what I have for granted? Maybe, I am. Then I see people posting memes about how they are supporting our nation in this great time of need by watching Netflix - and my blood goes to nuclear. People are equating themselves to the men and women of WWII that went into the work force to create the goods needed in our fight against Fascism. Irony-aside, Trump-supporters, you binge-watching Duck Dynasty is not the same as the person going to work to every day to make the KAYSADILLAS you and your family love. That person feeding your pot-munchies is more akin to a soldier in a war, than the people who stayed behind to support their efforts. You are akin to neither... are you are more like The Pumpkin King; a draft dodger and type of person who likes to let everyone know about your achievements in doing nothing. So, if you could, light a tiki torch or two for the people who are risking their lives and the health of their families every day to make sure KAYSADILLAS are getting made.
If I die for my employer - the joke really is on me. How fucking typical that I sacrificed myself for someone who couldn't identify my corpse (unless it's wearing my photo ID badge). Please someone sue them for enough money that my son can go to the college of his choice, and my wife will never need a paycheck printed by a company that valued it's own sustainability over the lives of the people printing those checks.
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