Mondays with Mike: Just put on the dang mask

I’ve had the dreaded virus, and though the jury’s out, it’s fairly likely I have some immunity for some time. That means it’s likely I’m a pretty safe bet to be around for at least awhile.

But.

My fancy mask, courtesy of Donna Hippensteel.

I like wearing my mask.

I like signaling to people around me that I’m taking this seriously, and that I care enough about them to make this tiny little effort. It’s a show of solidarity. And I appreciate seeing others doing the same thing. Besides that, evidence shows if we wear masks, we can drastically reduce the spread of the disease.

I also completely understand that how one views this virus thing has everything to do with where they are sheltering in place. At the board of directors Zoom meeting of the organization I work for, one member told us that in Maine, where he lives, covid19 is just not much of an issue up there. (Though, it is an issue at the local nursing home, which is why even in such places, we should be careful.)

Our friends in Champaign-Urbana are having a substantially different experience than we are up here. It’s an issue there, to be sure. Students are taking classes online, dorms are empty. And residents are mostly taking it seriously, according to some good friends we’ve been in touch with since this started.

They don’t have the problem back in our old stomping ground that we do up here in Chicago. And they’d like to keep it that way. But our friends there tell us that people from surrounding towns come into Urbana and Champaign to shop and do other business, and apparently, just don’t bother with the masks.

Beyond that, a friend’s father-in-law had to go to an emergency room for a heart-related issue in Decatur, Illinois. He’s 89. People in the waiting room weren’t wearing masks. He asked the security guard about it. “I asked them to,” the guard replied.

The kicker is, at one point, he had to ask a nurse, a NURSE, to put on a mask.

Yeesh.

I simply don’t understand that. I understand concerns and reasonable arguments about when and where to suspend the lockdown orders. But I don’t understand laziness and selfishness. And I call bullshit on the freedom people. Freedom doesn’t mean an absence of social obligation and responsibility.

It’s crazy. I feel like I’m that kind of old guy Republican from my youth telling shaggy-haired callow young guys like me that freedom didn’t equate to sitting around and smoking dope and having sex all day. (Still an attractive thought, though,)

Only now I’m telling people that freedom doesn’t mean being able to carry rocket launchers around in public and ignoring the health and safety of fellow citizens.

Whatever happened to that kind of Republican?