The legend of Antaeus – Hiking in Shenandoah – Convivial moments with friends – The questionable efficacy of our virus tests – The Russian vaccine – South Africa’s COVID policies – Evening statistics
After six hours of being on the trails and an additional six hours of driving yesterday I was, unsurprisingly, not especially lively when I awoke this morning. I kept dozing off before I roused myself sufficiently to get dressed, and even then I felt like returning to bed. But I had agreed to meet with AD and some other friends to hike in Shenandoah, and this turned out to be a good thing. I have already mentioned how on certain days I would begin the day feeling rather under par, and then the effect of exerting myself on the trails would perk me up. There is a Greek legend about the giant Antaeus, a son of Gaea the earth goddess. When he wrestled with Herakles the latter tried to throw him down to the ground to defeat him. But since he drew strength from contact with his mother, he promptly sprang up again ready for another round. The only way Herakles could prevail was to hold him in a bearhug in a manner that lifted him from the earth entirely. We all need contact with our mother earth from time to time; and I have known of more than a few who retreated to a cell of their own manufacture, shrinking from the outside world with fear, and who seemed to me to be choking like Antaeus in Herakles’ grip as a result of their lack of contact with it.
The weather was what AD called “ducky” – i.e., the moist sort of weather that appeals to waterfowl such as ducks and geese. But it was delightfully cool along Skyline Drive: the first genuinely comfortable temperatures I have enjoyed for many a long week. After all, it turned out to be not so very wet; we had a brief shower as we started, but it soon tapered off and for the remainder of the hike there was no additional rain, even though the skies were clouded. We started at the Dickey Ridge Visitor Center, going along the Dickey Ridge Trail to its northern terminus just before the park entrance and taking the Fox Hollow loop upon our return. We hiked about nine miles in all. It was muddy, of course, but not unduly so. Walking along the Dickey Ridge Trail felt almost like walking on a road after my recent experiences in Pennsylvania. The portion of the Appalachian Trail that runs through Pennsylvania has a reputation of being unusually rocky and, alas, its reputation is fully justified. It was such a relief to be on a path without any scree, where the rocks are for the most part set well into the earth and whose surfaces are not irregular, so that I did not have to concentrate on maintaining my balance most of the time. The wet weather discouraged other visitors. There were not many other cars parked at the Visitor Center and we met very few people on the trail. By the time we came to the Fox Hollow loop, however, the weather was somewhat dryer and more people were in the park. Several were on the loop and when we returned to the Center the parking area had many more cars.
And afterwards, of course, we snacked together and AD regaled us with peaches and melons and grapes from the numerous food stands in Calvert County, where she resides. I especially enjoyed the peaches. The ones obtainable from the supermarkets seem to have no more resemblance to peaches such as these, recently plucked from a tree just as they turn ripe, than a stuffed bird has to a live one.
It occurs to me that hikes of this sort can operate as a kind of substitute for COVID-19 testing. Fatigue is one of the main symptoms of the virus, and anyone afflicted with it is therefore not likely to be able to undertake the sort of hike I have just described. The incubation period is two weeks, which means that sometime about August 29th or 30th I can declare with a clear conscience that I was not ill on August 15th. That may not sound very helpful, but I can’t see that taking a test for the virus and obtaining its results five or seven days later is much more useful.
Russia remains the comically inept country described by Nicolai Gogol two centuries earlier. I have already commented on the vaccine it has developed – which said vaccine, incidentally Vladimir Putin is promoting among his compatriots as part of a protection plan. My doubts about the effectivity of a vaccine that has had so little testing before it is being distributed have received confirmation from a most unexpected source – namely, the Russian medical establishment. In a survey of over 3,000 employees in the Russian medical system, 52% said that the vaccine was developed too hastily and with insufficient testing, and that they would never take it themselves. Putin has publicly declared that he trusts the vaccine without any reservations and that one of his own daughters has taken it. This in itself raises an interesting question, because Putin has never confirmed the identity of the two women said to be his daughters and he rarely refers to them at all. A president advocating a vaccine that has been insufficiently tested in an attempt to assert Russian superiority and who offers, as evidence, testing on one of his alleged daughters who may not actually be his own, while the medical professionals of his nation recoil in distrust – we seem to be in the same country as that of Gogol’s Dead Souls, published in 1842: a country mired in corruption, where impoverished and broken communities are decked out in grandiose costume, whose inhabitants indulge in displays of boastfulness without even an attempt at verisimilitude, done not merely to reinforce deceit and fraudulent schemes but out of sheer exuberant delight of their inventiveness in lying.
We Americans are not lacking in charlatans and buccaneers, both clerical and secular, who attempt to portray themselves as larger than life and not bound by ordinary rules – and Heaven knows, a nation that has elected Donald Trump to high office of its own free will has little to boast about – but there is at any rate a rationalistic strain in our heritage to strives to moderate the effects of their frolics and insists on bringing facts and verifiable data to the foreground. Such an impulse seems to be completely absent in Russia, no less today than as it was in the times of the Czars.
South Africa is lifting nearly all of its restrictions, even as its case count continues to rise. It is true that the number of active cases has taken a downward turn, and this trend has been consistent for over a month. The number of new cases on a daily basis has also been declining (it was well under 5,000 today; it was over 14,000 less than a month ago). President Cyril Ramaphosa says that the virus has “peaked” and that it is now feasible to end the restrictions, which have been causing a great deal of economic hardship. These restrictions include bans on selling alcohol and tobacco, domestic travel, and the closure of many businesses. South Africa’s lockdown has been one of the most stringent in the world, so that the lifting of some of its restrictions may still be the equivalent of a lockdown somewhere else. Both international travel to the country and gatherings of more than fifty people are still prohibited. (Nothing like our own recent motorcycle rally in Sturgis would be permitted there, for instance.) As an interesting side note, the ban on alcohol has had an unexpected benefit: the crime rate in South Africa has plummeted. There is some justification for President Ramaphosa’s decision, but he is taking a big risk all the same. South Africa at this point accounts for half of the COVID-19 cases on the continent. But at least he is not acting out of bravado, like some national leaders such as President Bolsonaro of Brazil. He urges the South Africans to be on their guard and to be scrupulous about wearing masks in public. He is at any rate taking the virus seriously and seems prepared to restore the restrictions if a second wave of the virus occurs.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 21,592,094; # of deaths worldwide: 767,935; # of cases U.S.: 5,529,289; # of deaths U.S.: 172,585.