"Who's to say where the wind will take us? Who's to say what it is will break us? I don't know which way the wind will blow." - U2, Kite

My 13 year old son recently started a business and has made it his goal to earn $1000 this summer, building and selling Texas flags out of old wood and delivering them with me to his many paying customers. A few days ago he was outside painting one in the hot sun. It's a joy to watch him work, and even more so as he persists through adverse circumstances. Texas sun in July can be downright brutal, and to labor in it displays not only a firm devotion to one's calling, but an almost equally strong disregard for one's personal health.

I noticed as I walked outside that there had been a cloud covering him, helping to keep the heat of the sun at bay. As soon as I remarked on this out loud the cloud drifted away and my son looked at me as if I was somehow responsible for the sudden change in temperature.

It occurred to me that having the power to affect the weather is not something that I want. People tend to assume that just because you have the ability to do something, it means you are inclined to do it for them. So if word got out that I had the ability to make it warmer or colder depending upon my own whims, I can only imagine the frustration people would have with me when the weather didn't suit their needs.

"I haven't had a good rain in months," a farmer would tell me. "Why can't you just allow my crops a little bit of water so that I can continue to feed my family?"

"Really, today is not a good day for a storm. I planned a picnic in the park with my children," a frustrated parent might say.

And what if I hadn't even controlled the weather that week? It stands to reason that having such a power would not necessarily be something exclusive to me, but no doubt any time people were upset with their circumstances they would assume that it was I who had changed them for the negative. I might sleep in some lazy Saturday morning, only to be greeted upon departing my slumber by slews of people indignant that I had allowed a tsunami to destroy their beautiful beachfront properties.

Weather is one of many things that we accept as being completely out of our own control. Like the passing of time and the irrationality of illness, we've settled into the reality that life and circumstances will take place in ways that we cannot knowingly predict or adequately mitigate. And yet we have allowed ourselves to believe that taking certain drastic measures is necessary to prevent contracting a virus from which more than 99% of us will survive. We've sacrificed our work, our community, even our worship in the name of safety, neglecting to realize that adventure and experience are the reasons we were born in the first place. Teddy Roosevelt understood this, commanding the US Navy to continue to send its warships out to sea even in times of peace despite the potential risk to craft and crew. A 1901 newspaper quote reads: "President Roosevelt thinks that warships are not built to rust and rot in harbor. He wants them kept moving so that crews can keep in full practice at their seamanship, gunnery, etc. That sounds like hard sense."

John A Shedd said it even more succinctly in his book of adages written in 1928: "A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."

One might believe that staying at home and limiting our interactions is the surest way to prevent getting sick. While I could argue that doing so might cause irreparable harm to our own immune systems for lack of exposure, I'm far less concerned with that line of thinking than this: in allowing ourselves to stay confined in isolation, we have made the determination that our own personal safety is more important than the business of adventure that is our life. A people who once wholeheartedly agreed with William Wallace that every man dies, but not every man truly lives have now conceded that they are more concerned for their physical well-being than living out Christ's command to go into the world.

I'm not suggesting that we should have no regard for the safety and well-being of our neighbors. Doing so would violate an even more important command to love them as we love ourselves. But to discount their need for interaction and community is tantamount to deciding for them that it's better to live a reduced existence for a longer period of time than a full one for potentially less. I believe that this not only flies in the face of good sense, but I also find it uncannily prideful that a people of faith choose to place their hope in prevention and not in the God of Psalm 103 who heals us from all our diseases. The same God who the wind and the sea obey, and who sends both storms and droughts into our lives. Not because He wants us to suffer or shrink back in fear, but because the testing of our faith produces an endurance, and that endurance produces character, and that character produces a real hope which will not disappoint.

I'm going to be that guy.

Did you really just post a long philosophical post about how 3 months of dialing back social contact and taking reasonal steps to control a potentially fatal disease are hurting the human and Christian experience of life?

A few months of wearing a mask, not going to the movies, and avoiding crowds isn't going to stop Christianity or demean human existence. In fact, many people are using the time at home to build better relationships and explore passions that they never had time or opportunity to chase. No one should be suffering existential angst over a few months of relatively minor prohibitions.

If this thing starts to drag on for years, then I'd probably agree with you. At this point it just sounds silly.

Obviously your job was not lost. Your income not affected. What about a few months of no school for kids already at risk and behind? There is a whole world out there outside your bubble.

None of yall know anything about my situation, my "bubble", or my opinions about shutting down v. opening up.

The thing that bothered me about the OP was the defeatist fatalistic outlook. "No one expects us to control the weather so no one should expect us to control corona, so let's just act like it's not a problem and whoever dies, dies."

While this is certainly the most trying time period of my life in general, overall it's not that bad for people who aren't sick and dying. We all have food and everyone here has a computer/smart phone and internet. Sales of bikes, weights, kayaks, boats, trucks, sports cars, campers, RVs, and just about any leisure item is through the roof. So apparently people still have disposable income. Stocks markets are only about 10% off all time highs right now. Compared to all the horrible things our country has been through, this doesn't rate top 10, and it's only been 4 months. Surely we can be a little more resilient than this. It's more than a bit premature to roll over and bare our bellies to this disease