Caves of Steel/Gate into Women’s [Covid’s] County: With apologies to Asimov and Tepper

Asimov’s vision in the Caves of Steel was a future where social distancing had grown to become a near universal phobia of close personal contact.  Communication and physical infrastructure, including robots, was designed to facilitate life without other human beings around.  Sheri S. Tepper’s Gate into Women’s Country posited a segregation of the sexes with limited contact and a strict set of rules as to how the two groups interacted.  

Before the advent of Covid-19 vaccines, I saw a future where the human race has been divided into two groups; those who have had the virus and recovered, and those who have had no exposure to it.   The gate between the two groups is in the barriers between the two groups.  It could be a physical wall or a behavioral separation.  The separation could take many forms and the sizes of the two populations could vary dependent on circumstances.  The scenarios would be many. A small business might have two parts of their operations where employees come and go by different doors and never interact.  Schools, restaurants, sports venues, churches, all might have two separate groups of participants; patrons and workers.  Whole communities, even states, could be established.  The gate is only opened when someone new is infected and recovers.

Now, we have many vaccines, and many Covid variants, and many levels of immunity and susceptibility to the disease.  We also have the politically (and religiously) motivated refuseniks who are likely guaranteeing a continuous supply of "new" variants.  This may require many separated groups (everybody gets their own cave?).  As always, things are way more complicated than anyone could imagine.

The majority of people expect this pandemic and its effects to be temporary; but maybe it won’t be.  If the pandemic rages on; there just may never be a solution to it.  Remember,  the "pan" in pandemic means everywhere, maybe also every time, like "forever".

My last Tweet and Testament

Everything is changing.  Nothing will ever go back to even a semblance of yesterday’s “normal”.   Do not deceive yourself.  It isn’t going to be all over in the foreseeable future, maybe not in your lifetime.  

Given the continuing ignorant and incompetent actions of Trump and the amazingly complicit Republicans, I honestly do not expect my wife and me to survive the Pandemic.  We’re in our 70’s and although sheltering in place, I expect we will eventually get Covid19, later than many, and therefore, when the hospitals are overwhelmed.  I believe that everybody will get it, all due to Trump’s stupidity, ignorance, delusional denial, and his cultish base’s faith in him.  Those who refuse to believe in the danger will spread it all over the USA.  With Covid-19’s two week latent period, by the time they are convinced that it’s real, many more will be infected.  The deniers won’t die fast enough to be stopped from spreading it.

I had already decided to quit Twitter for reasons other than imminent death.  I deem it to be a black hole where truth and honest communication go to die.  Besides, if Trump finds it useful for his agenda, there must be something very, very wrong with it.  I quit FaceBook because I believed that it gave us Trump.  It has done incredible damage to communication; it is the platform of the crazy vandals.   I quit Twitter because it is Trump’s public media platform of lies.  It is finishing off the destruction of democracy that FaceBook started.  Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey, remember those names.

I am a confirmed atheist and do not fear death at all.  When dead, I will not know it.  That doesn’t mean that I don’t care about what happens after I’m gone.  I just don’t worry about what happens to me after I’m gone.

So, with this communication I will impart a few things that may make life a little better for those of you who do survive.  It will help adults care for children and ease their transition into the America of the future.  These are tips for country people; city folks I can’t help.

Teach your children.  Read. Read. Read.  The NASA channel has excellent and stimulating shows.  Science is available on the internet.  Avoid the amateurs and their junk science.  If possible, stimulate curiosity in your children.  If you can achieve that they will teach themselves.

Learn to separate “wants” from needs”.  The sooner you recognize all the things you can live without, the sooner you can stop wasting your efforts (and safety) attempting to acquire the “wants”.  Trips out among the diseased must be minimized.

Learn to garden.  Garden from scratch; learn to produce your own seed, plant starts, and fertilizer (compost).  Plant nurseries will never be the reliable source of starts and seed that we have come to expect.  Grocery stores too.  Save some potatoes from last year.  Cut the bottom inch and a half off your cabbage and root it in a saucer of water.  Collect dried bean seeds after the string beans get too tough.  Tomatoes want to produce new plants, they’re going to be “cherry tomatoes”.   Kale, broccoli, lettuce, they all can produce seed for next year.

Stop throwing stuff away.  “Garbage” pick up is just a way of losing resources.  Compost organics, save paper for fire starting (wood stove heat).  Not going to the store will result in your “garbage stream” being greatly reduced.  Repurpose things you’d normally throw away.  I have often made things out of pieces of stuff I’ve kept for thirty years. 

Bye, now.