Der Zauberberg - Day 19

                                                                    Lembras-te, Yaka, como acabou aquele medo?

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This is high time to get back to normal now. I strongly believe the epidemic reached its culminating point in western Europe. Now we will continue in this situation for some time, till we get well. Meanwhile, it's time to put my affairs in order, wake up from this slumber, before der Zauberberg overwhelms me completely, and for long. 
I hope to get any news from France soon, any outcome. To be sure how I should plan my life for the coming months. Be that as it may, I should think about my place in the Netherlands. I thought about buying any cheap house or a cottage somewhere not very far from train network. Just to have a place I might call home. For sure I would be wandering from place to place among the European universities for several years to come, but it would be good to have something of a permanent address. Later on, when my situation improves, I might still use that house as a secondary residence, a place where I might stay to write my books. 

Apparently, there has been many dead today in France. I constantly refresh the page on Worldometer, hoping this is just a mistake to be corrected soon. In a week, the same number of dead will be noted in Poland, and even if not officially recognised, I will know they are dead. I see them dead now, they appear in front of my eyes, just as my memory kept them in the worst moments. I know only too well how reckless they are, they have always been. They won't take the risk seriously, especially as they cannot see it. They will walk right into it, unable to change the slightest, the silliest of their habits. Actively refusing any piece of reasonable advice, any sanitary measure, just to show they are the wiser. While they are so incurably stupid. 

I promise myself to keep my vaccinations up-to-date; to keep provisions, fresh water, kapok jackets and an inflatable embarkation in the attic of my Dutch house. If we get a second chance to be reasonable; as I suppose we will. I have always been reasonable. I had sufficient medicines and provisions in my old house, I had my vaccinations roughly up-to-date; at least for those diseases I considered dangerous. Never considered vaccination against flu; never paid attention to the state of my respiratory system. Because I got used to have it malfunctioning. Yes, this is the source of everything, our habits of poverty, irresponsibility. Inveterate low expectations. I never expected my nose might be healthy. My mother used to tell me this is because I got it after my grandfather. I was trained to feel nearly proud of it, consider it as a sort of family legacy. And I was educated to despise medicine. How did they use to say? Doktor Gleba wyleczy. It was their motto. Now they stand dead in front of my eyes. And I'm afraid this disease does not offer such an easy death as some people in my country still seem to believe. Well, they probably mean it is quick. Not like cancer. But I know there will be no palliative care for anyone. Not in Poland. There will be no care at all.
 
In a way, there has never been. No care, no providence. The only expectation was Doktor Gleba's cure. They gave up their lives years, decades ago. I refuse to see the humanitarian crisis that is to happen now. Just as they refused to see other people's humanitarian crises. And nonetheless I see it in anticipation, as a grimy fog hiding everything. Cutting me away from all recollection of my past.