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We Are the Collective Protagonist
By lynmiller-lachmann on 2020-03-25 16:44:11
[caption id="attachment_ 13861" align="alignleft" width="300"] Friday rush
hour in the midst of pandemic.[/caption] I write this blog post from a near lockdown in New York City, one of the world's
hardest hit areas for Covid-19. As of this afternoon, more than 17,000 people in the city have tested positive for this deadly
virus, though testing remains inadequate, and around 200 people have died. The government in Washington, D.C. has pretty
much left us on our own, with limited information and guidance because the current president wanted to keep his infection
numbers low to help his re-election campaign. Run by his crony, the once-trusted Center for Disease Control (CDC)
complied. Fortunately, New York State governor Andrew Cuomo stepped into the information and leadership void, ordering
closures of non-essential business or work-from-home arrangements, stepping up local testing, and pressuring federal
agencies to approve the locally generated tests that have ramped up testing capacity beyond any other state in the country.
Supposedly, we are about to receive the extra hospital beds via the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the USS Comfort,
along with thousands of ventilators. We hope they will be enough. In the meantime, ordinary New Yorkers have stepped up
as well. The fashion industry is turning their talent and equipment to the manufacture of masks for health care workers and
others. Health care workers and first responders continue to show up for their jobs and stay overtime despite the dangers.
Every minute they work, they put their lives on the line, as do the retired health care workers who are returning despite
being in the demographic most likely to lose their battle against the virus. Teachers are not only sending work home to their
students now that the schools have closed but also volunteering to take care of the children of health care workers and first
responders. My daughter, Maddy, has volunteered to watch over these children and keep them safe and happy in the difficult
circumstances they and their families face. While she waits for her assignment, she is in touch with her students and their
families to sustain their education at home. These are the heroes of New York City. In this situation, though, everyone has a
chance to do the right thing. Staying at home, wearing a mask if one has to go to the grocery store or pharmacy, and sharing
or picking up necessities for a neighbor who cannot go outside contributes to the safety of everyone. We need to ‘flatten the
curve” to avoid overstressing our current capacity for hospital beds, ventilators, and medical personnel. Only by acting
collectively to isolate ourselves — so we don’t become sick or sicken others — can we do this. People, young and old, who
congregate in bars and restaurants and on beaches put everybody at risk. Those who harass people of Asian heritage, taking
their cue from those currently in charge at the national level, put innocent individuals at risk and threaten a local and global
community that must work together to defeat this pandemic. For instance, will China prioritize the United States or other
more tolerant lands, with vaccines, treatments, and equipment? I don’t expect mercy from countries when our leader
demonizes those countries and encourages violence against Americans who look like their people. One of my YA novels
features a collective protagonist. Right now, we are all the collective protagonist. We as a global human community face a
common villain — the virus that causes Covid-19. It is a human vs. nature conflict, but each of our decisions affects the
ability of all of us to survive. Some of us have acted like antagonists by encouraging dangerous or hateful acts, or preventing
those wanting to help from achieving their goals. Similarly, in a story involving a collective protagonist, not all the
individual characters want to help, and conflicts among them threaten to tear the group apart and allow the villain to win.
When I wrote my collective protagonist novel, I never expected to become a minor character within a collective protagonist,
with life-and-death stakes. But as a minor character, I can help by staying indoors (which I’m doing anyway while my
broken ankle heals, but I’ve begun physical therapy via email and telephone rather than in person), by encouraging people
not to engage in racially discriminatory acts, and by supporting my daughter who has chosen a bigger role in this collective
story.
