Character in the midst of COVID: Who DOES This?!

What kind of CHARACTER, indeed. Who, you ask, puts their life on the line to protect the rest of us? And with a business like manner, as if they just came to the office to put in another day. Who doesn't look for accolades but rather shuns them and insists on spreading credit among the team of people who have come together for a common cause. Who DOES this?! 

Yesterday, one such worker was interviewed, which came very close to the following replay:                    Interviewer: "Weren't you afraid; weren't you placing yourselves in peril?"                                                Respondent: "Well, we..." (quietly refusing to take credit for any heroism and focusing instead on the critical importance of the task at hand)

       By now many or most of you, given the timing (announcement last few days of record COVID numbers and hospital resources once again being severely challenged) and the nature of this blog, have identified the respondent as a health care worker, putting themselves on the line in the battle with COVID---whether a respiratory therapist who are once again finding themselves up close and personal with those needing respirators, or a nurse who is not only providing medical care but serving as a surrogate family member who can't get past the hospital entrance doors, or an ER doc who is frequently the first to encounter such patients in the hospital. Or you may may have guessed a grocery clerk who interact with hundreds each day in order to earn a meager wage, unaware of  who and how many have been tested, others who are asymptomatic but eventually diagnosed with COVID. Or perhaps you identified the individual as a first responder, who are once again finding themselves smack dab in the middle of this second surge, answering each call as it was the most important ever.

       While all of these would have been intelligent guesses, the answer is...a group of Zimbabwean demining experts called upon to help in the eradication of the land mines left behind from the 1982 military action in the Falkland islands between the Argentinian military and that of the UK. Like so many other military actions, the inhabitants find themselves unwelcome beneficiaries of leftover military devices, many potentially lethal. It took decades to organize, mobilize, and effectively recover the thousands of land mines left in Vietnam, for example. A legion of native people with missing limbs and otherwise debilitated as witnesses and collateral damage. But we can be thankful and should express our appreciation whenever and however possible for all of those who put themselves in harms way to achieve this laudable goal (with the Falkland islands being cleared ahead of the original time goal!). These individuals unknown to us on the other side of the globe, directly benefitting those inhabiting the area, while inspiring the rest of us. Inspiration that will hopefully galvanize us to step up if and when we have the opportunity, perhaps on not such a grand scale. 

       In the midst of COVID, CHARACTER indeed.