Tonight, the neighbors across the street are having a party. There are loud fireworks. There is loud music. Their dogs are going insane and the air is full of smoke. It’s like any other Independence Day in that there are at least two dozen more people in that yard than live in that house. I can hear them laughing from here. The doors and windows are shut.
Tonight, I want to go to bed early. It is customary for my family to have our friends over tonight, to go swimming, have a bonfire, and light firecrackers until the fireflies are gone for the night. We don’t this year, because a friend of our friend brought the virus from their church camp to the belated high school graduation ceremony. They don’t know if they have it. Altogether, there are eight of us. I made themed masks for the gathering. I don’t think I’ll ever use them. I hope I won’t.
The number of cases in my town has been climbing steadily all throughout the half-hearted, unenforced lockdown. The lockdown that is now, officially, lifted. I will be safe, and so will my family. Most of my friends follow suit. One girl’s parents still think Covid-19 isn’t ‘that bad’. I want to shout at them, shove statistics down their throats, make them lose their minds over again for each person who died because the president didn’t think it was that bad. I know it wouldn’t work, and neither would calm reasoning. I’m afraid for her.
I’m afraid for the neighbors across the street. I’m afraid for the members of my church. I’m afraid for grocers, cooks, sanitation workers, hospital workers. I’m afraid for protesters and a little bit for policemen too. I’m afraid for the woman in my mother’s online Bible study who jokes about the virus like it’s over.
My nation is falling apart. The world is falling apart, or so it seems. I am proud of the idea of the United States of America. I am proud of diversity, equity, exploration, freedom. I am ashamed of how they are ignored. I am lucky. I am privileged. I use it how I can. I am still learning, and there is an entire country to teach. Tonight, as smoke fills air that on any other fourth of July I would be breathing, I am afraid for my future.
Everything, it seems, is slowly coming to a head. It is exciting. Promising. I am proud of the people in my nation. But I am afraid for all of us.
