Coronavirus Photo thread

F1nut wrote: »

Lighting up buildings or whatever in blue is somehow supposed to make people feel better? Cure the Wuhan Chinese virus? Make people forget that our Constitutional rights are getting trampled on? Pay the mortage? Bring businesses back?

What a joke!

Normally I don't think much of these types of efforts, but this week is changing my views. My mother is still working in a hospital and this is not how she was expecting to spend her last year before she retires. Once she realized how bad this might get, she even considered retiring a little early so she wouldn't have to risk exposure or deal with the difficult situation ahead.

She stuck with it, and it has been hard. Understaffed, expanded ICU, etc. I'm proud of her for sticking with it. What does that have to do with blue lights, banging pots, and all these other "effortless" efforts?

Well this week my mom said her community organized an online thank you card submission. They printed all the cards and hung up hundreds of them in a large display at the entrance of the hospital. My mom said when she saw that leaving her shift she was so touched she started crying. When she can hear people doing the 7pm clapping and banging pots, it gives her extra motivation to keep going, or push through that night shift. It's truly giving her much needed emotional support.

These symbolic efforts don't fix much, but they are providing really valuable moments of support to uplift some people on our front lines. I never realized how well these efforts could actually work until my mom shared that experience with me this week. So keep the lights blue. Keep banging pots at 7pm, keep sending cards. Keep donating if you can. These small efforts are creating little moments with big impacts for people on the front lines.