Twas the 15th Day of the Lock Down. The Lock Down was past the midway point for the All Black Tribe, but other tribes had further to go to complete this particular journey through time. The reigning overlord of the Rising Sun Tribe decreed that their lock down would begin in a few days. The overlord of the Stars and Stripes Tribe advised his people that the worst week of their Corona crisis lay ahead of them.
The world was both locking down and loosening, as the stragglers locked down and the veterans learned how far they could loosen the restrictions. Lack of confidence about the future locked down spending everywhere as frivolous goods and services were ignored in favour of paying mortgages, rents, utility bills and food.
"What worth a man is appears best at a time of adversity, for circumstances do not make a man frail but they do show what sort of man he is" Thomas a Kempis opined in 1418. Thomas was an Augustinian friar who spent most of his remarkably long life cloistered in the Mt. Saint Agnes monastery, so his observation was peculiarly pertinent to a situation that forced, albeit briefly, billions of people in their own cloisters.
Shining brightly in the gloom, many proved their worth by quiet and often heroic self sacrifice: Doctors and nurses in many parts of the world died helping patients; supermarket workers did their poorly paid best to serve the public; many worked from home while home schooling children.
Shadier characters found their dark dispositions thrown into sharp relief. Many demonstrate d a total refusal to comply with the Lock Down; others gladly applied for wage subsidies they did not share with their workers; and a small minority were so malicious they spat on others with the intention of infecting them.
Some were merely silly rather than sinister. One less than sinister cabinet minister, wise in his own eyes, but a hopeless fool in the eyes of others, ignored his own ministry's rules twice in one week. Cinda had every reason to be hard and stern with this miscreant, but had to discipline rather dismiss him on account of the unacceptable chaos that would result. He would be removed when the crisis was over.
The crisis, however, was young and far from fully grown. "We'll see far better and worse conduct before this saga runs it epic course" Cone Man cone-sidered ...
The world was both locking down and loosening, as the stragglers locked down and the veterans learned how far they could loosen the restrictions. Lack of confidence about the future locked down spending everywhere as frivolous goods and services were ignored in favour of paying mortgages, rents, utility bills and food.
"What worth a man is appears best at a time of adversity, for circumstances do not make a man frail but they do show what sort of man he is" Thomas a Kempis opined in 1418. Thomas was an Augustinian friar who spent most of his remarkably long life cloistered in the Mt. Saint Agnes monastery, so his observation was peculiarly pertinent to a situation that forced, albeit briefly, billions of people in their own cloisters.
Shining brightly in the gloom, many proved their worth by quiet and often heroic self sacrifice: Doctors and nurses in many parts of the world died helping patients; supermarket workers did their poorly paid best to serve the public; many worked from home while home schooling children.
Shadier characters found their dark dispositions thrown into sharp relief. Many demonstrate d a total refusal to comply with the Lock Down; others gladly applied for wage subsidies they did not share with their workers; and a small minority were so malicious they spat on others with the intention of infecting them.
Some were merely silly rather than sinister. One less than sinister cabinet minister, wise in his own eyes, but a hopeless fool in the eyes of others, ignored his own ministry's rules twice in one week. Cinda had every reason to be hard and stern with this miscreant, but had to discipline rather dismiss him on account of the unacceptable chaos that would result. He would be removed when the crisis was over.
The crisis, however, was young and far from fully grown. "We'll see far better and worse conduct before this saga runs it epic course" Cone Man cone-sidered ...
No comments:
Post a Comment