Guess Which Kid Got Covid

Newsletter 2020-11-02

I was exactly where you want to be when you receive serious news: in the drive-thru at McDonald's. “Hello, this is [redacted name], the nurse at [the local school],” the caller said. “I’m contacting you to let you know Betsy has been identified as someone who had close contact with an individual confirmed to have covid.” To be honest, I probably butchered that quote. I’m not a great listener even under ideal circumstances, and at that particular moment, I was trying to pay for my burgers and fries. Why did I answer the call at all when I know full well that I can’t even do one thing at a time, let alone two? The call popped up as a local number, and, while 99 percent of the time it’s a scammer spoofing a real person, I’ve found it’s best to always answer on the off chance that it’s actually a school nurse telling you that your perfectly healthy ten-year-old can’t come back to school for two weeks. The last time the school nurse called, I got lucky and my six-year-old, Lucy, had merely…