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This Lonesome Crowded Dystopia

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One - Where to Begin?

Were we ever really "all in it together"? Was that the real hoax? Is that a "Big Lie"?

How do you not feel isolated when hundreds of thousands die and the real harm is that we didn't do more for the economy? Would my neighbors happily have let me die if meant they didn't have to wear a mask?

That feeling when you realize that your life means absolutely nothing to those around you. Seeing schools boards & doctors attacked for trying to serve their community. It all leaves a foul taste, even after positivity rates wane.

Was Covid-19 different? Is this how every pandemic feels?

My father often speaks of receiving the Polio vaccine when he was a child. He never mentions protestors or tyranny as a result. Never in my childhood did my vaccination seem to be very controversial. Maybe Polio was just that much worse, maybe that's why no one seemed to consider it a tool of government control.

Then I looked into it.

* 0.5 percent of cases move to the nervous system and result in flaccid paralysis

* Up to 70% of people infected with Polio have no symptoms

* Another 25% have minor symptoms such as fever & sore throat

* Up to 5% have headaches

* These people usually return to normal within 1-2 weeks

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polio

Doesn't sound much different from Covid. Sounds very much like Covid in a lot of ways. Yet for some reason my grandparents thought Polio was horrible and my neighbors think Covid is just the flu.

I often thought of Edward Hooper's book "The River: A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS". When I read it in my youth it seemed like a compelling theory that HIV originated from the development of the Oral Polio Vaccine. One of those oddly compelling ideas that the technology used to save lives might have unknowingly been responsible for taking more.

While the theory has been disproved in the minds of most, I can't help but wonder if this is now a "conspiracy theory". Is the memory of this narrative shaping my thoughts in harmful ways? Are ideas harmful? Dangerous? Are there some words just too dangerous? Can something as small as a tweet really be "violence"?

These are the things I question.

Yet at the same time it seems like all words are under attack. Simple thoughts can have large consequences...so this is where my ideas will live. Hopefully enough to coalesce my thoughts, but not attract much attention.