Stranded in the Time of Internet Malfunction and Corona

Sasha wasn’t one for blaring alarms. On all other mornings, she would wake up to the fantastical piano notes of the South Korean composer, Yiruma. Not that Monday morning, though. That Monday morning, the siren ringing from her phone kickstarted her heart and thrust her placid delta brainwaves into chaotic beta ones. Her body was used to waking up at noon but she feared that if she didn’t wake up at 7:45am sharp, she would remain stranded.

She had 15 minutes to rub the sleep out of her eyes, brush the bacteria out of her teeth, and pour almond milk onto her raspberry and yogurt fitness cereal before she had to open her laptop.

7:57am

FaceTime rang and her uncle picked up her call. They were in this together. He told her to breathe. She would get a ticket. But she needed to breathe. So Sasha breathed.

7:58am

She adjusted the laptop settings to turn off night mode so the screen could emit blue-light and wake her up. However, when the time came to open up a browser to access the website, Google Chrome froze and that’s when the hyperventilation began. Crying on the phone to her uncle, her exasperated lungs interfered with coherent words. All he managed to catch was something about a party and no masks and girls jumping away and glittery eye makeup? Sasha’s disconnected words didn’t explain the waves in her mind. 

A few days ago, the Illinois-weather was as divine as it got and perfect to enhance artistic endeavors. After showering, Sasha had applied elaborate makeup and wrapped herself in a flowing, floral, fuchsia summer dress. She brought all her art supplies out onto the balcony along with the cool, refreshing taste of grapefruit-flavored sparkling water in a wine glass—Sasha liked feeling fancy. Three glass panels boxed her in the balcony and were the only things separating her from the building’s public terrace. No one was around and no one was stupid enough to approach her during these times so she left her mask inside. She shouldn’t have done that. After a while of painting, a large group of drunk college students stumbled into the terrace—as belligerent as drunk college students could get. She hid the gawk in her jaws as she saw them collide into one another without masks. However, before she could even think to get her mask from inside, they had set up camp 300 feet away from her at the navy blue couches by the communal barbecue grill. A covered hot tub and weeds separated her from the petri dish so she resumed painting. 

Two glasses into her sparkling water, a group of three girls had approached Sasha and asked if she wanted to join their party. Sasha thanked them but declined their invitation. As soon as she said she was immunocompromised, the three girls jumped back from her, but that’s all they did. They complimented Sasha’s makeup and fawned over her glitter eyeliner. Why are they not leaving… Is it not enough to say that I’m immunocompromised? Do I need to tell them that I recently suffered from septic shock where four of my organs were failing, and even though I miraculously survived, the damage had been done to my kidneys, liver, lungs, heart, and overall immune system? How do I nicely tell them to back the fuck off because my immunocompromised ass doesn’t want to deal with their selfish obliviousness? Selfish. So. Fucking. Selfish. Sasha excused herself, packed up her things, and headed inside. She’d have to watch the pink and purple sunset from the safety of her bedroom window.

8:02am

Her MacBook was only two years old so Sasha was having a hard time fathoming why it was taking so long for her laptop to restart. 

8:03am

Her blood itched and her anxious fingers trembled against the keyboard, tapping away as if she had just started writing an essay due the next day. 

8:05am

Finally. Sasha had connected to the website but the only date available was two days from now. She needed more time to pack an accumulation of three-years-worth of necessary belongings and precious mementos. What bullshit. She was told the last available date was at the end of the month, two weeks from now. She had mentally prepared herself to leave in two weeks. She couldn’t leave in two days. Aside from packing, she had to figure out a way to say goodbye to her friends without endangering herself. 

But if she wanted to live, she didn’t really have a choice, did she? The small but lively college town had been her home for three years. Before that, she was born and raised in the west suburbs of Chicago. Never had she thought that fleeing would be in her best interest. 

8:07am

Her uncle said, “Wait, Sasha, how far along are you in the process?”

“The internet is so slow. I think I’m one step away from paying.”

“I just refreshed the page and seven more days have opened up,” he said.

9:23am

Almost all the days were available but she was still waiting for the second to last day, so she had time to pack and say her goodbyes from 6ft and cloth masks apart. As much as she loved her friends, she didn’t trust them. She saw them partying through their Instagram and Snapchat stories. They knew she was immunocompromised, and they had the audacity to be mad at Sasha for not wanting to hang out. She liked to think of herself as an elephant. They’re generally peaceful as the herd walks around while caring from the young to old alike. But when they get angry…they get angry. 

9:27am

Her uncle and she talked about what they would do when she got to his place. Sasha’s heart wasn’t in the conversation because it was too busy breaking as her mind drifted off.

She remembered her cousin, Alina, making fun of Sasha’s American accent while she spoke her mother tongue. Alina would tease Sasha but all in good fun. If anyone else dared to make fun of Sasha, Alina would step in and unleash a world of protectiveness masked in rage. Since Sasha was an only child, Alina was the closest thing to a big sister—even though they only got to meet once a year at the very most.

Her uncle—the one she Facetiming— her aunt, and Alina had been in Koh Samui when the pandemic blew up. They didn’t mind being stranded at a luxury resort. But then aunty got sick. Then uncle for sick. And finally, Alina got sick. No one had any underlying conditions and Alina was just twenty-five-years-old. Only one of them left the ICU with a pumping heart.

How were all the people surrounding her this stupid? Didn’t they have loved ones? Until now, the world had seen extreme ends of white privilege, male privilege, and financial privilege. But she never imagined she would see age privilege, at least to this extent.

9:28am

Sasha’s uncle was unaware of her train of thought so it seemed out of the blue when Sasha shared screenshots of a Facebook argument, even though she thought those arguments were petty and pointless.

A college friend from freshman year has posted:

“As I sit in a parking lot awaiting the Fourth of July show, seeing all the families and children around me (none wearing masks, for the record) so damn excited for the fireworks, I can't help but shake a feeling:

Screw all your bull handling of COVID. 

Stay inside if you are too worried about entering the real world; the rest of us are celebrating our nation's independence. 

People just want to live a long, healthy, and happy life. If something like COVID-19 is supposed to kill everyone off, so be it. That's the harshness of our natural world. 

Meanwhile, in REALITY, the rest of us just wash our hands and say excuse me and enjoy the fireworks.

I love you all, happy Independence Day!”

Sasha replied with:

“I’m usually not one to comment on worthless posts but are you fucking kidding me. This post isn’t for you. This post is to reassure others out there who are facepalming this that there are people out here who aren’t selfish.

There are 10,720,449 global cases and 2,671,220 of those cases are in the US. The US makes up 4.24% of the global population but 24.92% of the world’s coronavirus cases and 24.71% of the world’s virus deaths. I don’t know if math is your strong suit but it doesn’t take a genius to realize how ridiculous that discrepancy is.

It’s not only the elderly who’s at risk. According to the CDC, this includes people with:

-chronic kidney disease

-chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

-obesity (39.6% of American adults are obese)

-serious heart conditions

-sickle cell disease

-type 2 diabetes

-asthma

-cerebrovascular disease

-cystic fibrosis

-hypertension or high blood pressure

-immunocompromised state (weakened immune system from solid organ transplant, blood or bone marrow transplant, immune deficiencies, HIV, use of corticosteroids, or use of other immune weakening medicines)

-neurological conditions, such as dementia

-liver disease

-pregnancy

-pulmonary fibrosis

-smokers

-thalassemia

-type 1 diabetes

You’re, what, 21 years old? And the average life expectancy in the US is 78.54 years. So for the next ~57 years of your life, you can’t give up celebrating independence for ONE TIME?!

I want to know who “the rest of us” are that are outdoors celebrating, especially without a mask. Most everyone I know, including the people who have the luxury of a college education, and even the kids in elementary school, understand the serious implications of what’s going on and wear masks because it keeps everyone safe. They value human life over masks infringing on their personal freedoms.

Here’s a parallel of this absurdity:

In the 1980s, there was an uproar because people were forced to wear seatbelts FOR THEIR OWN SAFETY. But because it was “an infringement on their freedom,” they refused to do so and went as far as cutting off the seatbelts. We laugh at them now. Guess who’s going to be laughed at in 2060?

Go ahead and delete this comment and unfriend me. I have screenshots that I’ll readily post on my Facebook page denouncing such selfish stupidity and I’ll have a flood of supporters.

I hope no one you love dies because for some reason your college-educated brain couldn’t comprehend this seriousness that CHILDREN in third world nations seem to understand.”

The former friend’s cousin posted:

“i work in a hospital, and the trends we’ve noticed is that mostly people with type 2 diabetes are having serious issues. And there are over 3 million people in the US alone with type 2 diabetes. That’s scary”

Sasha posted:

“But like…fireworks are so pretty. It’s only 3 million people. If they weren’t at risk, only 143,700 people would die. Since they are at risk, give or take a few hundred? NBD”

The sister replied:

“dude idk u but you’re my new fav person”

9:30am

Sasha sent her uncle another link, directing him to her page where she had uploaded screenshots of the aforementioned thread of posts, and her two-cents:

“You ever wonder what it would be like if anti-vaxxers were in charge of running a developed nation?

Look no further because I am smack dab in the middle of it.

At least when you provide creationists and flat-earthers with empirical evidence, their denial doesn’t hurt others (other than the children whose throats they shove their beliefs down—but that’s a different story). But anti-vaxxers (their mentality anyway)...they’re a special breed of villainy lacquered with sheer stupidity. 

They’re the kind of people who take a bat to a piñata in a holding cell, which they share with 24 other people. Of the 24, 1 more person picks up a bat to join in on the fun, 1 person dies, 2 are hospitalized with 1 in the ICU, 3 are injured, and the rest are lined up with their backs against the wall but are still at risk of getting whacked. People try to get the anti-vaxxers to stop, and when they’re told how many of their victims had to be taken out of their cell, they say that the wardens are making those numbers up, and continue swinging because they prioritize their desire to milk every last drop of candy over human life; because all they see is the 1 other who is still swinging and the 17 others who are still standing.

“If you’re worried about getting hit, stay with your backs against the wall. If I give up my bat now, what will you ask me to give up next?”

That analogy is based on these posts and actual statistics.

To be honest, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to share this. I thought/think that the only people who’ll read this are people who agree with me. Of all the anti-vaxxers, how many are that way because of their co-morbid selfishness and superiority complex? And how many are just grossly misinformed?

You can’t change the anti-vaxxer mentality, can you? #ICanTry

I know that it isn’t the case but I hope everyone is safe (including the lunatics with the bats)”

Sasha regretted mentioning anything COVID-related when she heard how hard her uncle's laugh was working to disguise the stone weighing his vocal cords down.

9:32am

With Sasha squealing in delight, her uncle had to extend his arm to put some distance between the phone’s speaker and his eardrums.

9:35am

After they discussed airport and quarantine details, they hung up the phone and Sasha called her parents. They had the same reaction as her uncle when Sasha’s high-pitched voice regurgitated relief and excitement.

“I GOT IT! I GOT THE TICKET!”

Her parents asked her, “We’ve been waiting for your call for one and a half hours! You were supposed to buy the ticket at 8. What took you so long?” 

10:48am

The phone had been put to the side and Sasha stared out the window at the tall, breeze-rustled tree. She had lived in her apartment for two years and she still didn’t know what type of tree it was. What she did know was that she was lucky. Her parents could afford to send her to another country so she could remain safe. Thinking about all the people at risk who couldn’t escape and whose fates laid in the hands of her selfish generation, Sasha’s heart and stomach fused.

10:53am

Her shoulders and lungs cascaded along with her tears when she tried putting herself in the shoes of the elderly—the HUMAN BEINGS most at risk. As if the world wasn’t harsh enough on them already. Being forced to retire at sixty-five even though many could not afford to. Having no choice but to use cracked and uneven sidewalks. She had the luxury of healing fast after a fall. They didn’t. She remembered what her grandmother told her about how old people were invisible. People walked right by them as if they didn’t exist. This was before the pandemic.

Bile filled her heart as she attempted to look at the current state of the US through their lenses. She imagined herself in Florida on an old brown couch in the living room. The cream-colored, floral shades were drawn, giving the atmosphere a sepia glow. Her husband had passed away a couple of years ago. Her son was in another city tending to his pregnant wife. Her daughter was also in another city, trying her best to keep her asthmatic daughter safe. She envisioned watching the news about spring breakers congregating because it was their right to party; “true” patriots congregating for independence day because it was their right to celebrate; believers congregating because it was their right to pray. She pictured interviews where people expressed anger at being asked to wear masks, and rejected masks because if they gave us that freedom, what other freedom would they have to give up next?

Sasha thought about how everyone should have rights. But she never would have imagined a world where those kinds of rights took precedence over human lives. Now that she was done waiting around to buy flight tickets out of the country, she had to wait around until she could actually leave.

The longer Sasha waited, the closer it got to leaving, the more horrific acts of pure selfishness she witnessed, the more she felt guilt for being able to afford to escape, and the more ashamed she felt to belong to her generation. Many people her age understood the gravity of the situation. But that could never outweigh the impact of those who didn’t.

The closer it got to the flight, the longer it felt like she had to wait. She had stopped thinking about how her compromised immune system put her at risk. All that churned were empathetic thoughts, realizations, guilt, and shame.