Dispatches from the Pandemic Police

The other night I kept dreaming that I was under video surveillance and waking up frantic to find the hidden camera--in the clock? the light fixture? the phone?--until my groggy mind would remind me that only someone in truly desperate circumstances would consider footage of me sleeping particularly scintillating. 

The culture of surveillance invades my nightmares, but perhaps the nightmare is becoming reality. Who needs government surveillance when we're so good at policing each other? A man in a local town faces charges after he repeatedly called 911 to report that people were walking down the sidewalk past his house. Another family endured online shaming after neighbors reported that they had been walking through a park together without maintaining social distance--even though they all live together in the same house and brush up against each other multiple times every day. Forget to wear a mask when you step out to the grocery store and other shoppers tut-tut and shoot nasty looks your way, and it's only a matter of time before they start conducting citizens' arrests. (From a distance.)

Which is why I'm not going anywhere right now. I don't have any masks here and all my sewing equipment is at the other house, along with all my scarves and fabric, but my adorable daughter sewed and sent us some masks so I'm staying indoors until they arrive. Except for that long walk in the cemetery yesterday, with my husband, with whom I do not maintain social distance because what's the point? As long as our toothbrushes are mingling promiscuously in the bathroom, I don't see why I need to walk six feet away from him at the cemetery.

Which was empty--of the living, at least. Usually I see a few other walkers at a distance, but the windy weather must have inspired them to stay indoors. With so many people stuck inside for so long, it's no wonder that some are finding novel ways to pass the time: peeking out through the curtains to catch neighbors committing coronavirus infractions, swiftly dialing 911 or posting the details on social media. When our local self-appointed Pandemic Police can safely go back to yelling Stay off my lawn!, we'll know we have returned to normalcy.