Member-only story

An Open Letter From a Coronavirus Optimist

I know my glass-half-full attitude can be annoying, but panic isn’t the only way to respond

Kelli María Korducki

Published in

Forge

4 min readMar 12, 2020

A view of empty shelves as toilet roll is almost sold out in a supermarket. — Photo: Gareth Fuller/PA Images/Getty Images

Look, if anyone knows how annoying I am, it’s definitely me: the woman who has never once purchased Purell. Who has never deigned to open the bathroom door with her soggy paper towel. Whose home medical supply remains limited to treatments for hangovers, heavy flows, and the early signs of aging.

And sure, when you asked if I thought it’d be safe for you to hit the gym, I could’ve come up with a more reassuring response than “Just don’t lick the elliptical.”

When I complained about “those bourgeois yuppie assholes hoarding shit,” what I really meant was “I’m mad that my Whole Foods is out of beans.” (I wanted to make The Stew.) (Yes, of course I mean the new one.)

The truth is, I’m worried too. I haven’t mentally prepared for a pandemic—unless you count the remains of a short-lived canning hobby I tried last winter, my disaster rations are in a grim state. (Bergamot marmalade turns out to be disgusting.)

And look, I know it’s easy to get stuck in the all-consuming psychological hellscape of worst-case scenarios. Even for those who aren’t prone to catastrophizing, the rapid spread of COVID-19 might appear to forecast…

Am I a pessimist? US officials say that 30% to 60% of the public will become infected. The Germans say a little more, something like 70%. I have to assume I will become infected.

I do not need a test, I am either infected or I am not — a test is not…

For me the most interesting, and alarming, aspect of the current mass hysteria is to watch how our hardwired behaviors render reasonable commentary intolerable. As a primate group species evolved under conditions of uncertainty and frequent threat…