Remember that time in the year 2020 when the talk of the town was toilet paper? We were facing a worldwide pandemic, the coronavirus Covid 19. I don’t think the symptoms even involve the digestive tract in particular. But for some reason the big panic among the citizens of the civilized world was stockpiling toilet paper in case one had to be quarantined for the two-week duration of contagion. (That’s me, thinking ahead. There’s nary a roll of toilet paper to be found in any store… anywhere!)
Stepping back to semi-analyze it from my lazy boy chair, I think it rather curious that toilet paper has become the pinpoint of our panic. I guess we humans need something to focus on so we don’t swirl in fear, and if we can comfort ourselves by stacking up rolls of toilet paper in our bathrooms, well then, I guess this is a pretty easy fix. For two and a half minutes we can feel like we are in control.
No worries here. My mom taught me to always have plenty of TP on hand. That, and soap. And to play it safe, I also have an abundant supply of powdered cocoa. I figure if things get bad I can barter that chocolate for just about anything.
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If someone I love ends up quarantined, and I’m not, you can be sure I’m cooking up some grub and leaving it, with an extra pack of toilet paper, on their porch. They can open the door after I leave.
Tonight, Dave and I drove to Herriman to attend Anna’s Jr High Choir concert. In the one hour it took to drive home we listened on the radio as President Trump ordered our borders closed to anyone who has been in Europe. The NBA suspended all games, our church cancelled the public attendance of members in our General Conference next month, and Utah State University cancelled all non-classroom events. All this in one drive home. David is supposed to be in St George for annual ABA meetings and a judicial conference, but at the last minute last night they cancelled that gathering, so he's working from home the next few days. It’s getting real.
I’m pondering for myself how I fit, personally, in this swirl of panic. My experience with Guillaine Barre Syndrome has left me immuno-compromised. I am deathly allergic to poly-glycols, one of the main ingredients in hand sanitizers. Plus, I’m no spring chicken. I probably should be worried. Still, while I am cautious, and I sing a full verse and chorus of I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandy when I wash my hands, I feel a calmness that surprises me.
I certainly don’t want myself or anyone I love, which is pretty much everyone, to suffer unnecessarily. But my mind keeps trying to wrap itself around how crazy everyone is behaving over our physical condition, actually over our potential physical condition, when we are, in so many more eternal and consequential ways, spiritually and emotionally diseased. Why aren’t we up in arms about that?
Why are we not obsessed with rescuing young girls from the speeding traffic of child sex trade? Is my neighbor who is struggling to keep her head above water, emotionally, any less worthy of my compassion than the one who has a cough and a fever? Can I offer my intellectual and emotional energy to my own understanding of how my church might still be a growing place for me even though I don’t agree with every aspect of the behavior of some of its leaders? Maybe getting in my car and searching from store to store for toilet paper is a useful diversion from these weighty matters. We can plunk our money down and feel like we have bought our safety.
I don’t know. But what I am thinking is that I personally need to be more focused on my spiritual well-being than I am on my physical well-being. Not that I should be flippant about real physical threats. I’m pretty sure my spirit’s going to be with me a lot longer than my body. So, while I respect the fact that I want my body to be clean and comfortable and healthy, I want to remind myself, and those I love, that the condition of my spirit takes priority. The enemy might be easier to fight if we could put a label on it, like we do Covid 19. We can be really diligent in using all the tools to fight that. But the thing that could really take me down, in the long run, is less easy to describe, and more insidious.
Lord, give me the eyes to see clearly who my enemies really are, and the wisdom, the strength and the tools to either steer clear or fight them off.
