H1N1

First SARS, then the tsunami, then Typhoon Morakot, and now H1N1. When will God stop using south-east Asia as his personal punching bag?! The humanity!

At the first sign of the H1N1 virus, the world was in a craze. Until Michael Jackson died. Then we pretended to mourn him. Then Kanye totally burned Taylor Swift at the VMAs and we all were upset with him. So on and so forth, the big wheel keeps on turnin'. Only H1N1, or what was informally and formerly known as "swine flu," has not rolled off the ducks' backs quite yet.

I honestly thought that we, the collective global population, were over H1N1. That is until I began to hear my kids talking about. "If you have H1N1 then you will be dead already." Temperatures are now screened at the front door of the school, and each teacher has been issued a large spray bottle of alcohol hand-wash with instructions to "fire at will." Sure enough, H1N1 has crept its way out of hiding and back into our lives.

These days, H1N1 is a sort of lingering fear. Almost teen thriller-esque, with each person wondering who is going to get it next. And just when I was starting to get used to handfuls people on the subway and students in my class wearing surgeon masks on occasion, maybe to be polite if they have the sniffles, the masks become an accessory rivaling the abundance of watches or pants. Instead of students, I have a class of bandits.

"Hmphllo Teaschr Jshon," I hear through the mask. Before a kid answers I have to motion to my mouth to have them pull their mask down so I know what they are saying. Literally, every kid in one of my classes was wearing a mask one day.

On that note, however, my kindergarten class that has 21 kids enrolled in it, averaged 10 students for all of last week. A kid gets sick and they are doctor sanctioned to take 5 days off from school, probably for both recovery and prevention. My class was apparently a day behind the prevention part.

As a vaccination for H1N1 is hopefully around the corner, the struggle to contain the virus continues. For now, I'm safe, but I've instructed Mike to send out an email/post should I get infected and quarantined.