Freedom

Freedom

Yesterday afternoon, after nine days in quarantine, we finally got the call from the local health office: our negative Covid tests had been processed, and we were officially free to leave our apartment. Quarantine here is strict - there is no provision for any activity outside your residence, period. No walks, no drives, nothing.

We immediately arranged a play date with our niece and nephew at a neighborhood playground. For the first time since March, I got to watch my children play with other children. Such a simple thing, children playing with children, the most normal thing in the world. But of course for half a year the closest thing to playing with friends that our children could experience was a surreal mockery of the real thing. Sitting in a chair ten feet away while a friend jumped on a trampoline, sitting on the deck while a friend played in the yard. Now they were running around, climbing, digging in the playground sand, laughing and jumping and doing what children are meant to do. This was the moment that made me think all the insanity and stress of the last two months have been totally worth it; my children get to have something like a normal childhood again.

To be honest, the adjustment to living in a part of the world where Covid-19 isn't a huge danger is going to be very difficult for me. I have an invitation in my calendar for a meeting next week; a training session in a conference room with six people I've never met. I'm totally terrified. 

I know for a fact that there's no real reason to be worried; with extensive testing (I can't find local positivity rates yet, but Germany has a nationwide positivity rate below 1%), there have only been 12 confirmed cases of Covid in the county of more than 100,000 residents that we live in in the last 14 days. The county-wide rate is 0.84 daily cases per 100,000 residents, compared to about 17 in the Benton-Franklin County area we left. Context is important here, too; the current rate here is the result of a significant rise that is likely to prompt official action, and the rate back in Washington is the result of a reduction by half over the last month that seems likely to prompt folks to relax even more.

I assemble these numbers, as I have nearly every day for the last half year, so that I can do my best to make rational decisions about risk. But it's really hard to make rational decisions; when I was still in Washington, it seemed obvious that the rational thing was to hunker down, avoid social contacts, and so that's what we did, and it was a constant struggle not to feel like I was crazy for doing what the science said would keep me, my loved ones, and my community safe. Now the rational thing is clearly to be cautious, but to go to work in person when necessary, shop in stores, visit friends and family. But after six months of living in a much more seriously impacted community, now I can see that it's going to be a struggle not to feel like I'm crazy for not being hyper-vigilant and avoiding social contacts at all costs.

One new experience today that I'd completely forgotten about; quiet. Rose has taken the kids to the park again, and I am sitting at home, entirely by myself. This may very well be the first time I've worked for an entire uninterrupted hour since February, and it's utterly glorious.