In case you're looking for me, I won't be home… …I won't be stress eating…or smoking one cigarette after another…drinking myself numb…barely allowing myself to sleep. That would make things way too easy for you. If and when we meet, I will not be staring at a screen obsessing over every little detail about you. Because you're a virus…not an ex. I'll admit, at first, I was spending a lot of time asking all sorts of questions about you. “Where did you come from?” “Where are you going?” “Will you get stronger?” “How many lives will you impact before you're gone?” We fear what we don't understand. But I've had time to realize that it was never you I was afraid of. As it turns out, I didn't need to learn more about you… I needed to learn more about myself. I have been so concerned with losing my life, when not too long ago, I wasn't even sure of what I wanted to do with my life. So, I started asking myself the same questions I was asking about you. “Where did I come from?” “Where am I going?” “Will I get stronger?” “How many lives will I impact before I'm gone?” I should be mad at you, but I am not. I am really upset and disappointed in myself. I was asleep when you woke me, and I almost stayed asleep even after the “alarm” went off. Then the calls came in…from people I have known my whole life but whose voices I hadn't heard in months. I mean people were calling me who do not even call me on my birthday. The effect was contagious…I started calling people I had not spoken to in a while. All the time away from work and others has shown me what I really look like. I was always so concerned with my appearance. Just the morning routine alone was exhausting and stressful. I would wear clothes that I hoped would make me look thinner than I am, shoes to make me look taller, jewelry to make me look wealthier and then hop into a car I can barely afford to drive to a job that just scarcely provides the means to buy these “costumes.” It's so strange…they wanted me to put on a face mask but as it turns out, I've been wearing a mask my whole life. It's so much easier to breathe without all that added weight and the air has never been so incredible… I want to breath it all in. I keep wondering when you'll stop. When the world will go back to how I remember it. But the more I think about it, the more I hope it never goes back to how it was. I don't want to go back to being the person I was before you showed up in the world. There was so much about me I wasn't really all that happy with. I just kept distracting myself with any gadget, screen, drug or drink I could find. But you have forced me to spend some quality time with the one person I've been avoiding…myself. I've been forced to sit in my home and stare at how much I've filled it with emptiness. Crap I didn't really need, with money I didn't really have to spend, placed on shelves I never touched or even bothered to clean. Countless times people have told me, “Whatever doesn't kill you only makes you stronger.” But that has never meant as much as it does in this moment. All the energy I spent being afraid of dying has turned into a desire to actually live…not just maintain a pulse or a paycheck…but actually be present in my own life and the lives of others. I have finally been afforded the time to look at the seemingly endless photos I've taken. Which only helped me realize that life isn't about capturing the moment…it's about letting those moments capture us. I could sit at home, gain weight, watch TV, avoid everyone I care for and blame you for it. But I won't…I can't. I'm sick of blaming others. I've spent my whole life blaming everyone and everything for what was wrong and what was missing. I'm done with that. So, like I said… I most likely won't be home when you come by. I'll probably be on my bike…enjoying these empty roads attempting to move faster than you. I'll be strengthening my lungs so that they are less susceptible to your attacks and with every other breath, saying, “hello” to the others daring enough to enjoy the outside. But if I am home when you come by, I won't be alone. The rebel you've inspired decided on a different strategy than isolation. You see…if you want new results, you need new methods. I've spent enough of my life alone to know that isolation never heals…it hurts… it kills. I have filled my house with the people that remind me how valuable this life is and what I'm fighting for in the first place. You want them…? You'll have to get through me… and I'm not going down without a fight. If your only goal was to kill me, don't worry, you succeeded. The person I was before you arrived… is gone. I guess I have you to thank for that.

There have been other cases of flu and it never got to Africa; we argued! Flu is a white man's disease. In fact, it kills them fast; the average white man has lower immunity. Blacks are tough species of humans, more toughened by the toughness and roughness of the African weather and environment. Surely even our harsh weather in Ghana will dry up the virus and bring the rate of infection to negligible figures! We don't have extremely cold weather. These extreme temperatures are friends of flu viruses and we were sure that we could beat this terrorizing virus. My grandparents hushed our fears! ‘'Our foods are spicy, herbs and medicinal plants are our daily vegetables; we cook and over-cook our stuff unlike the white men of the western world! Worry not; COVID-19 wouldn't dare come to Africa! They said. At last, it did arrive at our shores! At the dawn of the lock-down! Fear became our bedfellow! Mainly because I had no savings to stock up food. Nobody to borrow from; God was my only resort! We could only pray and pray. No food! Our electricity recharge finished the very second day of the lock-down. There was no money to recharge the meter. A call to our church leaders provided no financial comfort. Is there any need to fast and pray? we are fasting already; my little son whispered into my ears late in the earliest nights of the lock-down! That did it! That's when I woke up! I stopped making calls, stopped troubling my neighbors; who were no better than myself, and began to think of what to do to make the most of the lock-down! The idea to make Nose-Masks with our used clothes and materials came up when I saw my eldest daughter wearing one. We all have been listening to the news and the clarion calls for the use of Nose-Masks as a way to reduce infection from the virus. My eldest daughter is very smart with needles and thread. Her Nose-Mask looked so cute as if it was made from a factory. The thread lines were so smooth, I was amazed! I called them all together and urged them to join in making many of the Nose-Masks. We could go from house to house and sell them. I could advertise them in all my Whatsapp networks and platforms. There was no accredited Nose-Masks making company as yet. It could sell! It certainly did! We spent less than 5 USD to procure all shapes and sizes of needles; various colors of threads and we all went to work. For two nights and days, I supervised and taught my two daughters and we produced the finest nose-masks and we used the fairly- new clothes from my wardrobe. We had to use the colorful yet beautiful materials to attract buyers. The traditional materials we planned to sell 1usd each while the less colorful was price-tagged for half of this price. My little boy and I took to the streets with 50 units of the colorful Nose-Masks and 25 units of the less. I still do not know where I got the boldness from! Was it the fear of starvation? Was it the need to survive? Whichever it was, God was with us and we sold them all! We came back and were able to procure electricity, cooking gas, Banku, and ingredients to make a pot of soup that could go for a week. On my return, the girls had made a pile of more Nose-Masks. They excitedly showed me new designs that they came up with in my absence. I was amazed! Phone calls came from friends and church members and we sold out more of the new designs. We started a call-and –deliver mini Agency! The last week of the Lock-Down we had competitors. The whole neighborhood seemed to have started making Nose-Masks and the price per unit went down! We had to stop production. We were already survivors! Necessity is the mother of invention they say. We survived the lock-down. We pray it doesn't come ever again! The Virus has reached almost all the regions of Ghana. Yet, it's not as bad as in the western world. Grand-parents were somehow right! The black man in his African sunny environment can beat the virus! We have the intense sun and highest temperatures of the world; we have herbs; we have been toughened by malaria and many other tropical diseases; We are poor in spirit and the scripture says that the kingdom is ours! We shall beat the virus and many others that dare to come!

But wait, it's getting hotter. We're expecting 117 degrees (F) by Friday, our near record-breaking number of days over 110 this summer, another expected record-breaker. Having more days over 110 degrees than previous years is not a record we want to keep breaking. The heat isn't making the virus disappear like a miracle. In fact, we seem to be in a blooming phase, our numbers are increasing like the number of fires popping up all around us. It happens in the summertime. I'm still amazed at who is okay with wearing a mask, and who isn't. It seems like the people who should be more worried, are not, and those who should calm down, aren't. There has to be a happy medium someplace, right? Personally, I'm good with the mask. I recently ordered an SPF 50 golf shirt that came with a matching mask, made out of the same SPF material. I figure the sun damage I'm not getting while wearing the mask for a couple of years (we could be doing this for 2 years?) will save me a decade or two of sun damage, out here in the desert where it's over 110 degrees for more days this year than last year. Maybe next year's heatwave will kill it.

On July 19, 2020, my mother and I finally stopped debating at 10 A.M. We get ourselves ready: a pair of jeans, an unenthusiastic t-shirt, shoes, and the last touch, a face mask. For several hours, we debated whether we should venture outside and if it was worth the risk. I assure you it was not. However, during the last few months, it seems as though our definition of what is worth the risk has shifted. We wanted out of the house. A day to pretend everything around us was just a moment that has finally passed. So, shopping was my suggestion for our venture out into the unknown. As we drove into the parking lot of the department store, I felt nervous, anxious. I have not been into a clothing store for the last four months or so. Why was I afraid? I was afraid of being around other people. I was petrified of being in one place for too long. And I was fearful of this being the place where I could encounter the virus, a place of unessential items, of no importance to life or death. First, I scanned the store to avoid too many people at once. We opted out of grabbing a shopping cart. Eventually, we had too many things in our hands and reluctantly resorted to the treacherous task of fetching a cart. The store had several carts already sanitized, but we do not trust their accuracy in disinfecting. I grabbed one, and I am perplexed on how I will clean the handle without sanitized wipes. I turn to my mother, who assumingly reads my expression, and she dumps hand sanitizer onto the handlebar of the shopping cart, rubbing the bar with her hands. I immediately become repulsed by her actions and reprimand her for such a cringe-worthy moment. Nonetheless, we continued sifting through racks of clothes. About halfway through the store, I felt sick. I could not breathe, and I wanted to rip my mask off and take a breath of department store air. I felt dizzy; my head was spinning, my heart rate rising. The risk of taking off my mask fluttering through my mind, and I knew I had to calm myself down. I had to remember why I was wearing the mask in the first place. It becomes difficult to do something that feels extremely alien. The mask has become a shield from the virus and a shield from the world we once knew. As my mother and I casually picked up items, I noticed other shoppers doing the same thing. Why are we all shopping? There is nowhere to go, nowhere to be, yet, here we are shopping as if we all have events to attend. My eyes scanned shoppers only to see their eyes in return. Their eyes filled with doubt, hope, indifference. Some seemed panicked and in a rush. Others daydream about where they might wear a new, pristine outfit. In contrast, some shoppers seemed determined to ignore a difference at all, unphased by the armor wrapped around their face, gripping their ears in an effort to remain a diligent protector against our one enemy. For whatever reason, we were all in this department store together, shopping for the future. Own futures that would help fuel our desires to maintain some sort of hope for the way things used to be. Uncomfortable with the amount of time we have spent lingering in the store, I urge my mother to the checkout counter. Another daunting task, spacing ourselves from other shoppers, practically holding our breaths until we reach the checkout clerk. An older woman, wearing latex gloves, a mask, and a transparent shield, waves us over to her register. She seems tired but does her job with ease. Her face is friendly, and her smile seems like it is always there, even through the adjustments of a world dealing with a pandemic. The risk she takes to continue her work makes me feel sad. She should not have to be here during a time like this. But maybe she has no choice, maybe she does. However, I still feel guilty and unsure of how to feel “normal” in moments like these. We leave the store and are emotionally exhausted, but the job is not over. We quickly throw our bags into the car and hurry to get to disinfecting ourselves. Ripping our masks off as if we just escaped an inhospitable terrain, we began the process of dowsing ourselves in hand sanitizer. The smell of alcohol sickens me, and the fumes turn from a haven to an inescapable high. We have managed to interact with society and engage ourselves in a common occurrence. I know my outside adventures will not always consist of the same feelings I experienced with my mother. The world will not always be in a state of fury and fear. I look at my son and see hope; I see the future of change in his eyes. And now that we can only see each other's eyes, I see people clinging on to a life they may have never seen before. My favorite author Paulo Coelho said, “Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place.” I believe I see those who still see our world as hopeless, but I choose to see people like my son, unafraid of the challenge to see beauty.

They held out as long as they could. Until one or the other took over. Fear or facts. There are a few holdovers, still arguing with complete strangers about how rediculous 'you all' look while they plant themselves in a grocery store entrance to throw a temper tantrum because they don't want to wear a mask. They don't want to follow the 'guidelines' or 'recommendations' of their 'leaders' (I'm not sure which is more questionable) that while it may or may not keep them healthy, it is the very least they could do, except for staying home completely, for their fellow man. It's sad, really. How easily people can deny what is happening around them. The It Only Affects You When It Affects YOU Syndrome. As the virus spreads and more become sick, the closer it will get to those who will have to decide what is real, when it is happening to them, instead of when it was still not quite a possibility that it might happen to them and something could have been done. To late. Yesterday there was one person without a mask lecturing a man, most likely strangers to each other, about how rediculous everyone looked in their masks and how 'this isn't real.' Personally I don't mind the mask. I haven't had a shave in three months and my skin is probably its best condition in years. The mask is providing me the best sun protection possible during the Arizona summer. Or anytime in Arizona. When all this is over, and someday it will be over, my skin will look better, and I will have fought off some sun damage. But that guy without the mask doing the lecturing? He was older, heavy, and wearing the worst hairpiece ever. If he ends up in the ER, he could be graded as someone no worthy of saving versus a younger person without one of those basketball beer bellies (yet). Or he'll survive this too and still look like that. Or worse with the sun damage and a few more pounds. It's just a mask. No one is asking him to enlist. But someone else might have to make the decision whether he lives or dies. It's not real.

It all started on a very normal day of quarantine. I was sitting around and doing what I had been doing for the past few weeks. Sleeping, eating, reading, and watching TV. Nothing very productive or demanding. Then my sewing teacher sent me a link for a tutorial and a blog post about masks. The blog post asked for people to make masks and donate them to our local medical facilities because they were quickly running out. My sewing teacher had the idea for us to make a few dozen masks and donate them. It started small. My mom started asking around on Facebook if anyone had any elastic that we could buy. That didn't work out in the way we were hoping. Eventually, my mom ordered some on Amazon. I thought would be the end of it. But it wasn't. My mom's posts caught the attention of someone with a very harebrained idea. This person had the idea to start a movement. This idea was called "Operation Come Together". I was the first person to make a mask for Operation Come Together. From then on it grew and grew into something amazing. It astounded me to see how many people came together to help stop the spread of COVID-19. There were countless volunteers and even more donations. All the while I made masks. In the beginning, the need was so great that I ended up sitting at my sewing machine for three days almost non-stop. I only took breaks for food, the bathroom, and sleep. It was exhausting and got a little monotonous, but it was worth it. After that, I slowed down. I worked on masks for a few hours a day. Eventually, I started to go to the headquarters of Operation Come Together with my mom. I went a few times, but I didn't go very often. It was very risky because my little brother is immune-compromised. After a few visits, I stayed at home to make masks. After about a month had passed the mask shortage in our area was curved and the factories had enough time to make and send more out. This was at the very beginning of quarantine. Now, almost five months into quarantine, I only make masks occasionally when someone needs them. Even though the rush has stopped, COVID-19 is still a pressing issue for all of our daily lives. It takes our loved ones, cancelled school, and has caused many of our family members to lose their jobs. It is a scary time that we live in. But I believe that as long as people are willing to help and to stand by those who need it, we will get through this.