In the Newness of Covid-19

You have been dying for over 2 years when we enter the era of Covid-19. We've cut off air travel, failed at cross-country travel, had more hospital visits, IVs, and emergency room conundrums for both you and I than one could have imagined. Surgeries in hallways with blue anti-bacterial fields when I say "Ok, I have to trust you", days spent wandering hospitals corridors alone as you uncomfortably sleep attached to data providing, panic inducing monitors. I've quarantined myself in the guest room for 14 days due to a cold - the longest, most lonely, miserable days one could imagine. And then later, despite face masks, on route to possible but not hope in Boston, I've also transferred whatever illness to you from whoever, wherever I got it. I've sanitized everything, over and over again until my hands dry out and my fingers bleed. I have imagined my life alone, without you...and decided why?
And now, it is all so much closer. Simple door handles, debit card machines, plastic wrapped containers, and empty parking lots hold forth possible disasters. How many places can I find to wash hands? Adrian Monk appears now even more genius with his assistant Sharona and her wipes.
Hospital beds are even more precious when they may become filled passed capacity as in Italy. And likewise the preciousness of community. All of those who've come to visit, all of those we've skied mountain tops, walked circles, lifted weights, held endless conversations and dinners with, they too are yet more precious when they become restricted. We are social beings yet "herd immunity" takes on high priority. Why do some not care? Yet herds also panic jump en mass off cliffs.
We should be enjoying the master's final gift, the retiree's travel. Two years of letting go. My extravert's heart is breaking. Yet, you lie sleeping, hours on end not panicked, in the dying sleep of peace.