500,000 gone, but finally not forgotten

I have written in these pages twice over the past year about the the staggering losses caused by the COVID-19 virus and our seeming inability or unwillingness as a nation to grieve and mourn. At each milestone, I worried that we were growing numb to the deaths, seeing the dead as mere numbers on a chart, detached from the actual people who have been lost.

This week, we reached 500,000 dead. These were not numbers, but our friends, family and neighbors, all gone in less than a year. Many dying alone, isolated in hospitals without their loved ones. It is the sort of unimaginable horror only dreamed up by science fiction writers, the plot of a book or movie come to life. We have seen more dead than all the recent wars combined. The United States now has the distinction of being No. 1 in the world in COVID-19 deaths, a distinction that only saddens us. But now we seem to be finally recognizing the loss.

This past year saw the impact of a national politics of denial, which was anti-science coupled with active disinformation. This willful ignorance, coupled with little to no planning or follow-through on the part of the former administration in handling the pandemic put the virus in complete control, leaving us helpless victims. The former president at first refused to recognize the magnitude of the disaster, then he tried to talk around it, making repeated promises that it would be over any day for weeks and months as the dead mounted.

Many Americans, too many, have suffered personal loss and tragedy during COVID times. Right now, some are actively worrying about family and friends who are currently infected with COVID. Their worry has been private, and in this world of social distancing, we also mourn in isolation. Grief and mourning, natural human emotions, for most of recorded history have contained both private and public parts. Collectively we gather to support our family, friends and neighbors to help them with their loss and to remind them that they are not alone. We remember and mourn together as part of the healing. In times of national crisis, the president makes speeches and there has been a history of recognition of national mourning. And while we might sneer at the presidential cliches about “thoughts and prayers,” they have become expected, civilized and comforting. It is a recognition that this was a national loss and tragedy.

There was plenty of talk about the importance of the economy and the lack of importance of masks. All the while there was no public acknowledgment or recognition of the mounting losses, no statement about the impact of all those empty places at our tables. Even the media was slow to circle around to this. Many, including me, at first excused this, saying we were too numb, too fragile or simply too caught up in the ongoing crisis. But, honestly, it seems now that we were simply not strong enough to mourn. Mourning makes one vulnerable, and to allow this vulnerability requires strength, a collective strength that was beyond our reach.

There was much discussion by our former commander and chief about the economy, thousands of tweets, yet he remained silent on the human loss. It was as if his silence on the dead could will away the virus. His own experience with the virus was acted out in public as a personal triumph, as if survival were somehow a choice or sign of strength. Losers and winners, not people, was how he kept score.

What a change then, to see President Biden lean into the healing necessary and healing through the collective act of remembering. His task is, as he said, to turn down the noise and the volume and heal this deeply fractured nation. A major step toward this healing is to mourn the hole in our hearts caused by this virus. We need to find the strength, the collective strength, to stare long and hard into this abyss and remember. This week he marked 500,000 lives lost and addressed the nation: “While we have been fighting this pandemic for so long, we have to resist becoming numb to the sorrow. We have to resist viewing each life as … a statistic or a blur. … And we must do so to honor the dead, but equally important, care for the living and those left behind.”

This role as consoler and chief is important as he continued: “As a nation, we cannot and we must not let this go on. … That’s why the day before my inauguration, at the COVID-19 Memorial at the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall, I said to heal — to heal, we must remember. I know it’s hard. I promise you, I know it’s hard — I remember. But that’s how you heal: You have to remember. And it’s also important to do that as a nation … we will remember each person we’ve lost, the lives they lived, the loved ones they left behind.”

“It’s hard sometimes to remember,” as Biden said in January, “but that’s how we heal.” Let us find the strength as a nation to actively remember the losses so we may heal.