Although I am only submitting this today, the events in this story happened on March 12th and 13th.

On March 12th my partner and I flew from San Francisco to see some family down in Brazil, because my sister and her husband had just had a baby in late February. I am not fond of flights, especially long ones, and my work schedule does not usually allow for extended international trips, so this was a rare opportunity to catch up and meet my adorable newborn niece. The trip had been arranged several months in advance, but as we entered March it became increasingly clear that leaving the U.S. at that moment was not the greatest idea. I spent some time anxiously reflecting whether I should go after all, but the truth is I was quite burnt out from the routine I had been on in the last several years, and really just wanted to change landscapes and see different people.

Our flight was long, with short layovers in El Salvador and Peru. In hindsight, considering what we now know about how easily COVID-19 spreads, changing planes three times seems especially reckless. It is amazing how, under certain conditions, something new can quickly become common sense!

I must say that the situation at the airport in SF was not at all anomalous, despite the news. In El Salvador, however, all airport staff were already wearing face masks; in Peru they held our plane upon landing and forced everyone to fill out these forms that clearly had just been off the press. It took some 40 minutes for the plane to start unloading, and before we could get to our gate airport staff in medical garb came to take our temperatures. The atmosphere at the airport in Lima was completely different than anything we had seen until then. We arrived in Rio de Janeiro early the next day, on March 13th, and on the next day we heard Peru had closed its borders.

When we arrived in Brazil there was no sign whatsoever that there was a global pandemic going on. None. It was not clear if the reason was purposeful neglect or simply that the real dimensions of the pandemic had not hit authorities yet. At any rate, the situation was unreal: I would check my e-mail and receive all theses messages from friends and workmates discussing the energetic measures that were quickly transforming life back in the Bay Area, while gazing at a crowded beach with life undisturbed. I find this very curious: clearly a global pandemic has its own speeds and intensities. Brazil was evidently behind Peru and El Salvador in terms of precautionary and treatment policies. And at least at that point, so was the Bay Area.

That same day my sister told me that the pediatrician, understandably, was adamantly against visits to the baby, especially from people who had recently traveled abroad. You can imagine the level of disappointment and frustration on both sides, so we decided to meet from a distance so we could at least see her in the stroller from a safe distance. How odd it is that in our first picture together her uncle is wearing a mask, at a distance, as though the picture had not been staged but had simply occurred, with me as a random element in the background.

Luckily, the pediatrician was well-informed, well ahead of what was happening on the streets. Today is April 25th. Everybody has been social distancing, and the baby has not received actual visits from her grandparents, uncles and aunts since the day I was there. Of course, everybody is connected, sharing baby pictures and cute emojis. There is love there, and there is a lot of time to think about how to love. I wonder how many babies in this generation will experience an outpouring of love via electronic means. I am not even sure what an outpouring of love in the age of social distancing actually means, but we might slowly find out.

[submitted on 4/25/2020]