When I’m not on the road, Sunday is the day when I get my
supplies and set things in order for the coming week. I like to get an early
start as it means I don’t have to stand in line too long at the market. With
the panic raging, lines are longer than normal, but I had some hope that people
had exhausted themselves by now. Even so, I got an earlier than typical start.
Apparently, I was not the only one thinking the same thing as the parking lot
had many more cars than typical.
The shelves were mostly stocked, which was a relief, of sorts. I
know more about the nation’s supply chain than most people, so I was not
worried that we would run out of food, but it was still good to see it
confirmed. Even the meat section was as full as normal and that’s the most fragile
bit of the system. Items with a short shelf life tend to the least resistant to
panic buying. Empty shelves are an exception in America, so seeing the stores
full again will calm people’s nerves.
Having stocked up pretty well before the panic started, I just
needed to top up a few things, but I took a look around the whole store just to
see how people were handling things after a week playing pandemic. While
picking up some skyr, I
caught a bit of conversation between two women. I’d say both were in their
30’s, toward the older end, and they had the mom look. One of them was telling
the other how great it was to have dinner together every night at the same
time.
That will be one of the side effects of the great lock down. All of
sudden, women are home and taking over their domain again. The kids are home,
so they have reason to reassert their control over that part of their life.
Many of these women will no doubt hate it and perform poorly, but most will be
reminded that being home and running the household full-time was always their
bets career option. Men will learn that having the wife home beats having a
second income.
In line, I struck up a conversation with a women about this
topic. The checkout has to be fumigated after each person goes through, so the
lines are thirty people deep as we wait for our turn in the delousing station. The woman is in finance, so she
can work from home. She has kids at home now, so she’s happy work has slowed up
with the great shut down. Her kids get their school assignment over Skype, but
she has taken over the normal instruction they would get in class.
She told me that she and the other moms are now talking about
putting together their own community home schooling operation. I almost laughed
out loud a few times as she explained how she and the other moms got a look at
what their kids are being taught and how they can do much better. She was bit
angry, for example, about the errors they found in the science books the school
is using. There will be a lot of this type of stuff happening around the
country because of the lock-down.
One of the unexpected
consequences of this panic and the economic collapse that is now certain
to follow, is people will discover the joys of want. We
tend to think it is always terrible to do without, but there is an odd pleasure
that comes from having to sacrifice and conserve. The mom I spoke with while
waiting almost sounded giddy about the idea of simplifying the household diet
in order to accommodate the shortages in the grocery stores. It will give her
purpose again.
That will not just be about food. She said something
about the lack of TV sports was a bit of downer, but I countered with the fact
that everyone now gets to discover outside again and she lit up. No doubt she
was thinking the same thing, but was happy for the confirmation. She and other
moms are now taking over the fun time for their families, rather than
delegating it to the entertainment business, sports leagues and the schools.
Again, it will give these women purpose again.
On the other hand, we still
live in a world of rule by exception. The right thing to do when
someone says, “we need to normalize wearing masks in public like the Asians” is
to punch them in the nose. That should have been the answer to people telling
us their pronouns or their weird sexual fetishes. Instead, we committed
ourselves to making one exception after another to accommodate a metastasizing
number of weirdos, oddballs and trouble makers. The mask freaks will just be
another.
That said, I doubt the mask thing lasts long. Americans are not
going to live as if we hate everyone. Social trust has broken down, but it is
not gone entirely. The reason Asians love masks is they have been practicing
social distancing for 5,000 years, so the mask compliments a natural instinct.
Conformity was their answer to the problem of social trust. To westerners,
living such an existence will be a bridge too far, so the weirdos pushing it
better enjoy their hazmat suits while they can.
Something I thought about as I was leaving is that suddenly the
status hierarchy for women has changed. The mom I was chatting with was feeling
really good about taking control of her household. Suddenly, the women taking
care of their kids, taking over their schooling and being a stabilizing force
are cool. Those career women sheltering in place with their box wine and social
media account can no longer kid themselves about their real status in society.
There’s been a lot of
wishful thinking about a baby boom coming from this lock-down, but what may
follow is a marriage boom. Millions of single women now have no reason to exist,
because they are stuck at home. They can’t cause drama at work and they can’t
cruise the bars with their friends. Meanwhile, the women they made sport of at
the office are having the time of her life at home with the family. There’s
some chance this panic opens some pretty young eyes to the reality of their
existence.
On the way out, I stopped
at a light and noticed that the trees are all starting to turn green and the flowering
trees are about to go into peak bloom. Persephone is making her way up from the
underworld and all of creation celebrates.The cycle of life is immutable, which
means that all things come to end, even plagues. It also means they are
replaced by something new. A lot of bad things will come from the great
lock-down, but on the other side will be some good things too.
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