Hey, America, you don’t look good in panic. Let me see if I can reason with you and get you back off that ledge.
“Hi, Mom. You look great. I’m here for you.”
The Wutang Flu is a real thing, but it is something we have met before. We met it — meaning a virus for which we had no vaccine — last in 2009 when the Swine Flu (H1N1 flu) arrived. It, too, was a national emergency.
We ended up with:
60,000,000 people infected,
265,000 hospital stays, and,
12,500 deaths.
Those deaths, like the current situation, were aggregated amongst the elderly and the immune system compromised.
Back in 2009, we did not panic.
So, dear reader, we have seen this movie before
What we are doing today is trying not to arrive at that 60,000,000 people infected and thereby reducing the number of folks who are elderly and have a compromised immune system — and, therefore, with a bullseye on them.
We are fifty states, each state with its own government, leadership, public health department, and resources. We are, essentially, fighting 50 different battles, wars.
Washington State (769 cases and 42 deaths) is entirely different than, say, Texas (76 cases, 0 deaths).
In the case of Washington State most of the deaths are from a single nursing home, Life Care Center of Kirkland, that had the misfortune of becoming infected. Bad break.
Fear
We are all caught up in the fear that is the byproduct of uncertainty — will we or a loved one get the corona virus? The answer for some of us is YES, for most of us, it is NO.
Fear is a corrosive emotion that exacts a toll on the carrier. It saps our energy. It consumes our time. It bends our judgment. It shoplifts our opportunity. It dampens our rational experience — our ability to impose what we have learned on the present and, thereafter, on the future.
We are given free will and in that free will is the ability to transform the energy of fear into action. It is all about energy.
When I was in the Army, back in the day, I had the opportunity to read a research paper that explained the phenomenon whereby a man risked his life under difficult circumstances and won the Medal of Honor.
Universally, men who won The Medal were men who became angry when confronted with adversity. They were angry men, but the story doesn’t end there.
These angry men transformed their anger into action and while others were cowed, frozen — these men took action. Action in the face of adversity is the definition of courage, bravery.
It is the same bravery, courage that allows a single mom to get up, put breakfast on the table for her kids, get them off to school, and then herself off to work.
She will not win The Medal for her exploits (maybe she should), but she is a kinsman of those men because she transformed fear into action and by that action she advanced the cause of her family.
Call to action
We are being called, all of us, to action. We are not being called to huddle in fear.
So, today, I ask you to do five things:
1. Turn off the television and stop the flow of fear and panic over you. Put on a raincoat. Get under a shelter. Raise an umbrella.
2. Resolve to take some action to save yourself — wash your hands, cancel a meeting, encourage your people, maintain that social distance. Exercise your free will.
3. Talk up your book — call someone and tell them how you are coping with things, write someone a letter, an email, a text message. Spread the message.
4. Tonight, when you go to bed, say a prayer. Don’t ask for something for yourself. Instead, pray for our country, our leaders, not that the Wutang Flu will disappear, but that we will have the grace to meet this challenge.
When we are united, there is nothing we cannot do.
5. Just before you nod off, remember who we are. We are America. We are the greatest idea that ever became reality.
We went to the moon because it was there and we could.
We were the Arsenal of Democracy who beat back evil in the Second World War — that is the blood that flows in our veins — and we are the people who will save ourselves in the face of the Wutang Flu.
Each of us doing what we can.
When you get up tomorrow, having done all of the above, take a deep breath, stretch, and say, “One more day just like yesterday.”
In some fairly short period of time, the wave will crest, the new cases will recede, normal will reappear ,and we will go on with our lives. We will look back and say, “Wow, we way overplayed that.”
Until then, stand strong, convert your fear into action and know this — we will beat the Wutang Flu like a rented mule, just like we did SARS, MERS and a bunch of other corona viruses.
When I was a soldier and commanded a combat engineer company of 200 men, we would practice attacking an objective as a company of four platoons. After the order was given, but before we crossed the LD (line of departure) we would say to each other, “See you on the high ground.” Meaning, we would rally together when we had secured the objective.
“See you on the high ground, America.”
Now, get in off that ledge, America, and get to work. Work from home, of course, if you can. Together, we got this. God bless America!
