It’s the middle of the night and I can’t sleep because the
music is too loud and I’m mad at them.
My neighbors are having a party and the music is blaring
outdoors. This is the third time this month. The first was a small gathering on
Memorial Day and I was shocked as the cars pulled up and guests spilled out,
carrying foil pans of food. My husband and I had looked at each other,
wondering if we hadn’t gotten the memo that the pandemic was suddenly over. The
last was two weeks ago, seemed like a child’s birthday party (the huge “8”
balloon and unicorn bouncy house gave it away), and now, tonight, they’re
eating and dancing and laughing on the front lawn like all is well in the
world. Don’t they know that even though it’s Saturday, I have to go to work
tomorrow? Don’t they know that I have an autistic preschooler who can awaken at
the drop of a hat (or a ray of sunlight) and that his lack of sleep can ruin
his entire day? Don’t they freaking know that we are in the middle of a
freaking pandemic?
I’m so mad at them.
How can they be so selfish?
Let’s get real: it’s not really about the music. Yes, it’s
true, I’d rather not spend my night playing a game of chicken with a subwoofer.
But really, it’s about COVID. How can they be so nonchalant when in our country
alone, over 100,000 people have died from COVID, most without family by their
side? When MIS-C is emerging as an enigmatic and frightening disease? Call me a
pessimist (or a pediatrician), but I see every kid on that lawn as a potential
MIS-C patient. (I also wonder, as a pediatrician, why the children are still
awake at this hour.) In pediatrics, we don’t typically care for patients with
diseases brought on by poor choices such as lifelong smoking. But now I may be
caring for children who are stricken with COVID or MIS-C because their parents
wanted to party. I wonder if there’s anything more selfish than that.
If I’m being even more honest, I realize that I’m angry, but
not exclusively at them. When I come home from the hospital, I have a
decontamination ritual: I head straight for the shower, stow my work shoes and
work bag out of the way, wipe down my glasses and cell phone, and wash my hands
until they’re raw. The only indoor places I have been since March are the
hospital and my house. So why do colleagues of mine stop at the grocery store in
their dirty scrubs, on the way home from work? My children are
distance-learning and distance-socializing, and my autistic preschooler is
regressing without his essential services. So why have friends of mine been allowing
their kids to have in-person playdates all along, half-heartedly doling out the
ol’ mental health excuse, topped off with a shrug emoji? My own baby brother, a
twenty something single in the city, has decided that after weeks of social distancing,
he’s done. He’s jumping back in to socialization head-first and doesn’t care
what anybody has to say about it. How can they be so selfish?
The New York Times published an article about how social
distancing represents a giant marshmallow test and we are failing miserably.
I’m not talking about families steeped in poverty, making painful decisions to
go to work so they can literally put food on the table, or about cancer
patients weighing the risks and benefits to go in for their chemo sessions. I’m
talking about people who are more or less financially comfortable just deciding
that they have had enough. Why do people think that just because they’re bored,
or lonely, that the pandemic is over? How can they be so selfish that they’re
willing to expose not just themselves, but countless other people?
Here’s what I want to say to them, my neighbors, and everyone
else who is flippant about the pandemic: This is hard. Disease is hard, the
economic reality is hard, loneliness is hard. But please. If you just do your
part, we will be closer to going back to normal. Yes, the country is opening up
a bit. In my state, at least, you can go to a restaurant and sit outdoors, buy
a car, or have a small outdoor religious gathering. You want to start relaxing
the rules even further? I’m not going to stop you. But please, don’t have a
party like the one you’re having, an indoor-outdoor affair where the fifty of
you are dancing together and the handful of you that are wearing masks have
them hanging down at your chins. I see white-haired people at your party, and
that one man in a wheelchair. Please, I beg you, just consider if it’s really
worth the risk.
And please, for the love of God, turn off the music and put
your kids to bed.
