Schools have started back up, locally and nationally. Hendrix is virtual, which is a relief. They tried so hard not to be, because people think virtual college isn't as good (they might be right, although I'm not sure we've seen this much pedagogical know-how applied to the problem before, so maybe the naysayers are wrong). UCA is a weird mix of remote and on campus, but I think it's primarily on campus. And the K12 schools are in.
I'd you need verification of how much people don't understand, or don't want to understand the disease, you need go no further than the city's Facebook chat page. There you see some people asking how many cases there are, others reporting what they've heard, others commenting that the disease isn't real and why do you care if your kids gets it.
I keep waiting. With fatality rates what they are you would think we would be losing more beloved figures (or maybe we are, and people are too entrenched to connect the dots). This disease his the perfect sweet spot of killing just enough of us to swallow the naysayers to cause paralysis.
Our tiny state has one of the highest infection rates in the country, and our country, of course, has one of the highest rated in the world. We're ground zero. So if people here aren't working out out, imagine how hard it is for a state or region that has it under control to convince people to do the right thing.
I actually called a friend today to ask if I was crazy to still be in quarantine. I'd seen another friend out at a restaurant for dinner, and I just didn't understand why anyone would do that.
So I'm here, waiting for exponential case growth (between the start of school and the Labor Day weekend we should start seeing explosive numbers). I've told anyone who'll listen the schools will be closed by October. But I'm not sure, because I'm beginning to think no amount of infection, and maybe no amount of death, will convince people.