January 2020: I actually work with a team of people based in Wuhan, China, the center of the coronavirus outbreak. While their office was closed for Chinese New Year, the government placed them under quarantine.
February 2020: My Wuhan colleagues' break was extended from Jan. 31 to Feb. 13. Then it was further extended to Feb. 20. (As of now, I don't think they're "officially" back to work yet, though the people I work with have been working from home. I get periodic updates from them during occasional meetings, and as far as I know, everyone on our team is healthy - they were told the government may lift the quarantine by April - three months!) When I had an update from them worth sharing, I would post on Facebook so my friends could hear from the "front lines" as well. One of my friends got me hooked on the vlogs from Ben Kavanagh, an Irish man teaching English in Wuhan during the quarantine. Over the course of the weeks of videos, he shared what life was like under quarantine, his evacuation back to the UK, being in quarantine there to make sure he was healthy, and finally being reunited with his family.
Wednesday, February 26: The CDC had just made their prediction about spread in the US on Tuesday, advising people to stock up on a couple weeks' of supplies, so I stopped at Target mid-day to restock on staples (paper towels, toilet paper, hand soap, toiletries, etc.). There was plenty of everything in stock, which surprised me a little. I thought it might be good to get some hand sanitizer, but I didn't see it anywhere. I used the Target app to see which aisle it was supposed to be in, and realized why I hadn't seen it when I had gone down that aisle before: the entire section was empty, except for a handful of small bottles.
Tuesday, March 3: Big canisters of industrial strength disinfectant wipes (they kill tuberculosis!) appeared in kitchenettes and other areas around my office. I also noticed a lot of Purell hand sanitizer stations. I know some of them had always been there, and maybe I just hadn't noticed before, but I feel like now there are more.
Wednesday, March 4: I finally made it to Costco. The fresh meat selection was very limited. There were palettes of bottled water sitting out. Every shopping cart I saw included a pack of toilet paper. Signs advertised limits on staple items (flour, sugar, rice), water, and disinfectant products. The eeriest thing of all was that the upper shelves of the warehouse, that are usually full of backstock, were mostly empty. I also went to my regular supermarket, staple items and canned goods there were pretty low, but I was able to get what I needed.
Thursday, March 5: Went to visit my nonagenarian grandmother after work. I washed my hands immediately upon entering, sat across the room from her, and didn't hug her goodbye (but gave her a fist bump). She didn't understand why I was being so serious about cleanliness, which I couldn't understand since I know for a fact she has the news on all day long. It wasn't until I got home that my husband reminded me she was probably getting a very different story from her constant stream of Fox News. I also stopped at Trader Joe's, they were pretty well stocked, but canned goods were fairly wiped out, and the freezer cases were low.
Friday, March 6: My husband and I went to Target for a couple things. The store is weirdly empty, and the household/cleaning supply section is nearly empty. The area where hand sanitizer had been is just gone - it's just hand soap across the whole area. We ran into a friend and elbow-bumped in greeting. We kind of joked around about the virus, and how seriously we should or shouldn't be taking it. I was feeling pretty good, and pretty confident in my ability to just practice basic hygiene. So good, that...
Sunday, March 8: We went to see Dweezil Zappa on his Hot Rats Live tour. I had been really nervous about being in a theater, so close to so many other people, but did ok while there. I went to the bathroom before the show, and the other woman at the sink and I took our time carefully washing our hands. Then she slid her hand down a railing the whole way back downstairs to the theater 😕 Someone a couple rows behind me was coughing for a while, but they stopped. I was surprised how many people were there - the show was sold out, or close to it, and almost everyone was in attendance.
Today, Monday, March 9: So much happened today. I was supposed to go to our Manhattan office for a meeting on Wednesday, but we were told to stay home and meet virtually. By the end of the day, they had effectively closed down the Manhattan office, as New York is under a state of emergency. My company has banned international travel unless absolutely critical, as well as gatherings of 25 people or more. For any meeting, they have to be in a room that holds double the capacity, to allow people to spread out. This is affecting the student business program I volunteer with at work, since our meetings usually have about 35 people - we'll plan tomorrow for some alternatives to finish up the program. Over the weekend they announced a few COVID-19 cases in my state, and then a couple in my county, but today there was one in my town. That person may have had contact with students at some local schools, so the district I live in and some neighboring ones are closed tomorrow for "sanitizing."
I've been having trouble sleeping. Usually my mind races after watching a thought-provoking movie, so imagine what it does when this stuff happens in real life. I usually fall asleep to the soothing murmurs of the news on NPR, but my ears pick up the non-stop COVID-19 coverage, so now I'm picking a boring podcast to play so I can at least get some rest.
But I'm not going to complain, at least not yet. I don't know exactly what my colleagues in Wuhan are going through, but they've been going through it for a month and a half at this point, so I have no room to complain.
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