Outrunning Uncertainty

Tomorrow, in Massachusetts, all outdoor athletes will need to wear a mask during their workout, even if no one is in sight. COVID needs strict rules.

I’m not for or against, I’m acknowledging. 

Tomorrow our country may find out who we’ve elected as the President of the United States. At the time of this writing, the race could still be won by either side, and am deliberately not making this a political piece. 2020 has been a year of uncertainty, starting with SARS COV 2, and all the questions about who is at risk, how can it be detected, what is the best way to treat or prevent, and as all these questions persist, there is this insistent, acute uncertainty about who our next president will be, and how long will it be until we know?

People do not love uncertainty. During the Bubonic Plague, some people responded to the uncertainty of the danger plague victims posed by abandoning spouses, children, friends, villages… danger was imagined to lurk in every unknown, including with other people.

I do not love uncertainty. But I don’t intend to leave my family. So I keep my routine, maintaining the certainty of that. Part of my daily routine is exercise, outdoor when possible. I wore a mask for my whole run and while I knew I was exchanging gas just fine, it made me uncomfortable and panicky. Because I was uncertain about whether I could finish my run like this, and “what will happen to me and what will it be like, running with a mask on all the time?”

I’ve run long distances in masks before. I can’t help but think today’s panic while running was really about who is going to win the election and how will we all respond to the unknowns: who voted, who didn’t, who you supported, will we continue to treat each other as uncertain unknowns, enduring divisiveness?

I do not have more words for the butterflies I have in my chest. 
I have pictures of the single action we could each complete to play a part in the outcome. I also hope that, regardless of outcome, we choose not to abandon the work of being less divided. I of course have a photo for that, too. 

-Dr. S