Isolation Drills

It's been 18.5 years since 9/11, which is the measuring stick for everything that came after in terms of big events. It was the event that "changed everything" and there's a lot of truth to that. But here we sit, in the middle of the biggest slowdown of modern day life I've ever seen. It wasn't caused by terrorism or war or weather or a natural disaster; nope, it was COVID-19, which has infected nearly 218,000 and killed 8,800 worldwide.

This virus is so infectious and insidious that essentially the entire country has been ordered to stay home from work and school and each other indefinitely. All sports--professional, school, recreational--have ground to a halt. Events have been canceled or postponed and everyone is supposed to maintain a safe distance of 6 feet from others. The idea is to keep the infection from spreading the way it has in China, Italy and Spain, where most of the deaths have occurred.

I'm lucky enough to have a job that allows me to work from home, so that's what I've been doing the last three days, while Deb and the girls are also home from school. I've worked from home before, but this has the potential to last a lot longer. In Massachusetts, schools have been ordered to be closed for three weeks, but some think if the infection rate continues to grow, that absence could be extended. Meanwhile, I'm set up in our kitchen and it looks like that may be the case for a long while.

My gym's closed, so I won't be able to do my usual free weight workouts for a while. The hockey rinks where I skate a few times a week are closed, so that's done for now. But I can run and I can do pushups and I've got a few dumbbells, so it won't be a total loss. I had signed up to run the Ipswich Ale Half Marathon in April, but that was just postponed, as was the Boston Marathon. Both girls were set to play spring sports, but that's in limbo.

The NHL and NBA seasons were suspended and are in jeopardy, especially as more players test positive for COVID-19 seemingly every day. March Madness was canceled and MLB pushed the start of its season to mid-May. Normally, this time of year, there's something great to watch every night in terms of sports. Now, there's nothing.

Bars and restaurants are closed. Concerts have been called off. Streets are mostly empty. It's really weird. All we can do is stay home and wait this thing out. Stir craziness kicks in from time to time and we're only a few days into the quarantine. But we have to hope enough people stay home to keep the infection rate from getting out of control. In the meantime, we're going to see a lot of these four walls.