Twenty years ago I wrote a letter to my son, Kris, after he told me he and his wife, Eve, were expecting a baby. In the letter I used the phrase: “You are changing your life forever.” I then went on to describe my perspective on how several decisions we make and milestones that occur change our lives direction and outcome.

Now all our lives are changing, maybe forever, through no personal decisions or milestones. And it has happened very quickly over the past 2-3 months, in all parts of the United States and around the world.

Although Coronaviruses have been well known for some time, this is a new strain with no developed vaccine and little effective treatment. What is known is that COVID-19 is spread by close contact with other persons and it can be very deadly. At this time the only potentially known prevention is to eliminate contact with already infected persons. In that effort, gatherings of groups of all kinds are being cancelled and individuals are being asked to stay in place and hunker down as much as possible. This is unprecedented at least since the 1918 Flu epidemic, and is already resulting in massive disruption of all our lives and becoming a disaster to our economy.

To me this shows that everything and everybody is interconnected in important ways, sort of like a circle. As long as the “circumference line” remains intact, the circle is complete. But if something interrupts that line, the circle is broken and everything starts to come apart.

Throughout human history we have become more and more dependent on others for our growth and survival. From the beginning, humans have gathered into tribes, then cities, then states, and finally into nations. This has resulted in individual labor and activity becoming more and more specialized resulting in a more productive society. But this also has resulted in many of us losing many basic survival skills, or not having access to them to provide for what we need, ourselves.

So here we are today with millions of people having to be isolated, many having a few economic resources, and the economy potentially collapsing. This will potentially lead to loss of individuals jobs and no means of support.

Individual scientists are frantically looking for a cure or vaccine for this pandemic, and all levels of government are struggling to figure out what to do. In the United States, the lack of a coherent national healthcare system is somewhat hindering these efforts, but it appears individual healthcare providers, business, and local, county, and state governments are stepping up with rapid decision making and not waiting for the current inept national administration to get its act together.

I suppose all I can do is conserve what resources I have and avoid interpersonal contact as much as possible in my effort to stay healthy. To that end, I recommend my family and friends do the same since that is probably the most we can do.

Unfortunately, sometimes our lives change forever whether or not we have anything to say or do about it.

Ken Kaiyala
3-15-2020