Coronavirus April 10

Like everybody else, the pandemic is "top of mind" 24 x 7 for me. I'm writing to help myself not internalize all of it. You can find other posts in the series at https://odonnellweb.com/pelican/tag/coronavirus.html

The day started off with a bang. I was skimming Twitter while still in bed and discovered Butch Walker had released another single from his upcoming album. Good Friday indeed! The song is a total throwback to AM radio around 1979, and I mean that as an absolute compliment.

Something about the song, or maybe the connection to the late 70s got me thinking about optimism, or more specifically the lack of it in America today. I don’t remember optimism as a defining characteristic of my childhood, mostly I remember not thinking much beyond the next day. Whether that was just my age or the nuclear bombers parked on the runway a couple of miles away I’m not really sure.

The belief that our kids would have it better than we have has been a trademark of American optimism, right up until my generation. I’m pretty certain few GenXers believe that our kids will have it easier than we did. Gen X probably isn’t going to do better than the Boomers, but the Boomers are too self-absorbed to notice or care. They are the generation that is still supporting Trump after all.

Even before the current crisis, nobody thought Millennials would have it easier. The wealth gap, crushing student death, non-existent real wage growth and crushing problems such as climate change and crumbling American infrastructure are becoming their burdens to bear. Now we add a deadly pandemic that the White House is totally mismanaging, which will cause thousands if not tens of thousands of additional deaths in the US. Guess which generation will be picking up the pieces on that?

I ran my 3-mile walk route tonight instead of walking it - needed to mix things up a bit.

Tonight’s plans - watch the new Pixar flick Onward, which is already on all the streaming sources because what else are they going to do with it?