The scene is a trope in many spy novels and movies. The undercover agent moves through a foreign city, she is nervous. She looks at each passerby, is that man an opposing agent? Is the old woman by the vegetable stand really selling potatoes or is she a watcher? That man with the newspaper, is he on the lookout for her? The couple with the dog, innocent pedestrians or counter-intelligence operatives?
Going for a walk in the age of COVID-19 feels a lot like that. Every person on the street is a potential carrier. That old man without a mask, what is wrong with him? That woman sneezing, are those allergies or is she symptomatic? That guy with the water bottle, is that a dry cough or did a swallow go down the wrong pipe.
This is my city, but it is foreign all the same.
We are all spies now. I can’t trust anyone on the street and no one can trust me. So I engage in this strange six-foot dance—was that even six feet—making wide berths around the other, wondering why they didn’t make take evasive measures first. I smile, as much as smiling is possible when I wear a mask. But the return smiles are either invisible or thin, barely papering over the suspicion.
Once the inevitable opening happens, this suspicion will become even deeper. No longer is just on walks or at the grocery store, that we have to worry, but at the job, at the meeting, in church. Did they all wash their hands before coming into the room? Did their husband, wife, son, daughter, father or mother practice proper distancing yesterday? Did one of them, even just for a moment, forget and then carry the virus home and pass it into this room? Once the kids go back to school, is it the kid of the mom who thinks dirt is healthy and vaccines wrong, or the kid of the mom who’s wiping everything with 99.9% antibacterial cleanser five times a day, who will bring he virus into the classroom.
As we know spies in the field lead lonely lives because they can’t trust anyone. How will we deal with that?
We’re all clandestine in strange cities, hoping the virus doesn’t blow our cover.
Wow! Good analogy, that we feel some characters in your thrillers. Suspicion shadows us, makes us fear strangers or the careless friend.