A Status Update to Planet Earth

Too much has happened since my last post. I don't think I live in the same timeline anymore. Everyone talks about returning to some semblance of life, but that's a luxury I'm finding hard to enjoy every single hour as this thing seeps on.  We're hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel, and the odds are in our favor that the light will return, but what will the costs be?

This is the story I was able to see when I looked back just a few months ago, when my biggest worry was how to make the car payment. The story of my body and how seeing my boy sick for the first time just illustrated the terrible epic drama for what it really was: our lives were dictated by our relationship with health. I use to remember walking around the streets of Los Angeles with an anger against something unfounded, throwing fire into the wind towards anyone who cared enough to endure it. I don't know why I was so angry at it all -- the world, but it was something real that lingered deep within me. I was waiting patiently for my first real battle against the natural world and come to grips with the truth: I am only a sojourner made of fragile flesh.

There is something terrible about this human experience; our realities are just a play of aggregated sensory inputs dictating what is happening outside of ourselves. We only know what we experience and what whatever we don't know, we attempt to learn through aural history. The entirety of human knowledge was passed along through ancient texts and storytellers that carried the journeys and tales of our ancestors; it was the only way we knew what was possible.

So where do we define truth in the information that we are fed?

We are now a part of a digital era where everything is recorded, captured, streamed, and stored for the use of Lord-knows what. And what becomes of the human body when the mind is no longer the most optimal engine that powers ingenuity in our realm? We are tangling with big questions I know, so let me take a step back.

This pandemic is forcing us to grip with  the most elemental questions of our own civilization: are we all really in this together? This comes as a harsh truth to the ones that subscribed to the philosophy that we are every man for ourselves.

But let me go back to a couple of months ago: I ended up getting the flu shot twice!

Now, I've kind of always been paranoid about getting the flu shot. Are these fears grounded in any hard research and fact-checking on my end? No. So, I am here to clarify that I don't freaking know what is in the flu shot, but I get them anyhow because I figured, "hey! I trust my doctor enough to get one."

In the last few years, there's been a real uptick in the anti-vaccinators narrative that the vaccine for influenza is harmful to children or worse, manufactured specifically to keep people sick. Now, I'm not going into the details of these theories out of fear of spreading false information, but I did become susceptible to the possibility of mistrust. And can you blame me? I'm not a doctor. I would absolutely have no idea what the hell is happening outside my four walls if it wasn't for the media. If you ask the doctor, "hey man, what's this for?" I'm pretty sure they are going to give you a very legitimate response. After all, this is for your benefit. That's what hope in this medical system is for.

Now, this is where I just come out and say it: I don't believe in conspiracy theories (wow, I can finally live my life as my authentic self).

The only way conspiracy theories work is if every party involved are all in on the drama -- pulling the levers in unison. This seems to come as one big farce -- which is sexy and scary and spooky and  exciting. But then again, I subscribe to practical belief and, again, human beings are terrible at keeping secrets -- the public finds out one way or another.

Let me reiterate again, "I don't know what is in the flu shot." Does that make me misinformed? Does that make me uninitiated?

I'm sure there are doctors with logical sense to point to both sides of any argument and provide a case. But in the end, it is still just a perspective. I haven't sat down with many that hold medical credentials, but the ones that did told me I hadn't need to worry over Covid-19 because the numbers just wasn't there (taking place just a week before the government lock-down).

So, I have to dismiss it all by simply saying that none of it is apart of my experience. Yes, work has been disrupted somewhat and I have to work remotely, but does it warrant the notion that my life is at a total risk none like anything I have ever witness before? I believe in the very clear danger this mass scale infection has upon the world. In fact, I would say that I hope that it will finally shake the wits into ourselves, just so we can begin to speak and ask questions and engage on the very topic that should be put front and center.