Skip to main content

First It Came, An Ode to Corona Virus COVID-19

This is not a post for bilingual families. This is not a post for stay-at-home moms, or moms of three, or moms Guatemalan by marriage. This is a post for all moms (and dads!) everywhere, who are just trying to hold it all together in a world that has turned completely upside down in just over a week. It was a Chinese virus, a Chinese problem. Then it was an Italian and Iranian problem. And now, it’s a pandemic and everyone’s problem. The Corona Virus, COVID-19.

It reminds me of the famous Holocaust poem by German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemoller “First They Came.”

Well, here’s the new version. “First It Came”

First it came to Wuhan, and I still went out, because I wasn’t Chinese. 

Then it came for the Italians, and I still went out, because I wasn’t in Italy.

Then it came for the elderly and the immune-compromised, and I still went out because I was young, healthy, virile, and ignorant. 

And then it came for me, and there was no place left to go. 


For some reason, Americans as a whole think we are invincible. I know that’s a grand over-generalization, but we see wars, famine, and sicknesses overseas and we think our industrialization and technology can somehow protect us from everything. But COVID-19 has taught us just how vulnerable we are as a nation, and as a world. It has not only stolen the lives of 18,810 and counting, it has halted air travel, closed schools and retail shops, caused the stock market to plummet and online shopping to skyrocket, and resulted in mass shortages of toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and disinfectant wipes. 

175 million people in 17 states, 26 counties and 10 cities are being urged to stay home, the Barrios family included. 

Yes, we have food and water toilet paper and wifi, but that doesn't make mandatory social distance quarantine easy, especially sequestered at home alone with three kids underfoot. We are all embarking upon uncharted waters. We are worried about how the quarantine will affect our 9-year-old's school year, how it will affect my husband's landscaping business (our only source of income for this year), and even the two-year-old and baby are feeling the effects, wondering why we can't visit the library like we usually do, or go to our weekly outing to the mall. 

The virus has completely upended our lives and our schedules, and it's okay to not feel okay. I pride myself in having everything all together all the time, but COVID-19 is something I have no control over. And that scares me so deeply. But the one thing I do have control over is myself and my family. For that reason, we are adhering to the social distance quarantine to the best of our ability. Although the idea of being cooped up in my house for the unforeseeable future sounds torturous, we have our health, as so even on the longest, hardest days, I have to be thankful for that. I've seen twitter posts that say something like "Your grandparents were called to war. You’re being called to sit on your couch. You can do this." Obviously that person doesn't have three kids! But in all seriousness, we can do this. It might be hard. It might try our patience. But the best way to keep all of our friends and family safe is to just stay at home and wait it out. Only then can we flatten the curve, and protect as many lives as possible. One day closer to infinity. 

Good luck and godspeed! 





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is 5 Little Monkeys Racist?

I’ve seen a lot of Tik Toks debunking children’s nursery rhymes lately. I have two toddlers, so now whenever I hear one of those rhymes, I think about their unsavory origins. But my son loves, loves Five Little Monkeys. He’s just learning to talk, and can almost say it by himself. I’ve thought about telling him to stop singing it since I learned in the original lyrics it’s not monkeys jumping on the bed, but he just gets so much joy from singing it as he jumps up and falls down, I thought... no harm, no foul, right? As long as he thinks the song is about monkeys, it’s ok.  Until my niece came over one day, and the three toddlers were playing on an old mattress we have on the living room floor for them to jump around on. My son asked me to sing 5 Little Monkeys. At first it was cute, because they literally were jumping on the bed, but then I took a good look at the three of them.  My kids are half-Guatemalan but very fair, like I am. Whereas my niece is half-black, and her skin happens
Post a Comment
Read more

Why You Should Travel with Little Kids

I took my first cross-country road trip when I was six-weeks-old. My parents loaded me up in an old Ford Wagoneer and drove me home from my dad's hometown of Pittsburgh, PA, to my hometown of Ojai, CA. After that, we traveled back and forth between the East Coast and the West Coast every summer of my life. A few times we flew, but most years we loaded up the car with the suitcases, the dogs, and the children and drove 3,000 miles across the country. This early exposure to travel instilled within me a joy of seeing the world, and since that first trip I have visited 34 states and 14 countries. And I hope to share that same joy with my own little ones. Traveling with children can be hard--it disrupts their nap schedules, may involve crossing timelines, and definitely pushes everyone beyond their comfort zones. But seeing different countries and different parts of our country as children gives them a greater appreciation for cultural and regional differences, and it widens their exper
10 comments
Read more

Reflections on Immigrant Life and the American Dream by a New Citizen

  Buenos días estudiantes de sexto grado. Mi nombre es Audelina Barrios, and I am a former student of Fuller Middle School. Soy de Guatemala, y viví mis primeros trece años de mi vida en mi tierra natal, pero desafortunadamente perdí a mis padres cuando tenía 12 años. Mi hermano y yo fuimos huérfanos por un año hasta que tomamos la decisión de empezar nuestro viaje hacia los United States to meet our oldest siblings.  In August of 2014 we finally arrived in the land of our dreams, the United States. During our first 4 months in the US, we lived in New Jersey with my oldest sister, Rosa, and went to a school where ESL didn't even exist. I was paired up with the only Latino in the school y sin saber una palabra en inglés. I felt like an outsider because I had no other friends and like I wasn't even part of the school system.  In January 2015 my older brother Francisco and his wife, Mae, adopted us and we moved to Framingham. My first school in Framingham was Fuller Middle School
Post a Comment
Read more