We can't throw ourselves into shoulder-to-shoulder rescue work with strangers, the way we would if we were digging someone out of earthquake rubble. We can't funnel into houses of worship or yell together at ballparks.
如果要在地震廢墟中挖人，我們都不能和陌生人肩并肩地進行救援工作。我們不能擠進禮拜堂，也不能在棒球場一起大喊大叫。
My local public health instructions, as I write this with summer still more than two months away, probably sound like yours: I must not rest my head on my daughter-in-law's shoulder, rumple my godchildren's hair, or put a hand on my neighbor's arm as we tell each other we'll get through this. Flatten the curve. To meters avstand. Maybe two meters isn't enough, it turns out; look up "airborne coronavirus." Or, better yet, don't, because you'll find yourself reading arguments about whether invisible little virus clouds left lurking by six-feet-away heavy breathers could conceivably find their way up our noses. Maybe we should stay 20 feet from other people. Maybe we shouldn't walk out our front doors at all.
我寫下這篇文章時離夏天還有兩個多月，我所在地區的公共衛生指令可能跟你住的地方差不多：不準把頭靠在妻子的肩膀上、不準玩弄孩子的頭發，或者當我們和鄰居鼓勵彼此將會度過這一切時，不準把手搭在對方的手臂上。壓平疫情曲線。保持2公尺的距離。結果證明，2公尺可能還不夠，搜尋“通過空氣傳播的新型冠狀病毒”就知道了。或者干脆別查，因為你會找到許多爭論，關于2公尺外的呼吸沉重者所留下潛藏在空氣中的病毒微粒，是否有可能進入我們的鼻腔。或許我們應該與其他人保持6公尺的距離。或許我們根本不應該出門。
For how long? Not knowing, trying to get to sleep every night still not knowing, is one more hammer to the heart. By the time you read this, things will be better where you are, or worse where you are, or zigzagging from worse toward better as long as you sit at least three bar stools away from the next person and figure out how to sip under your mask. Do you love someone whose daily life requires exposure danger? A bus driver, a nurse, a police officer, a home health aide, a grocery clerk, a production line worker at a meatpacking plant?
疫情會持續多久？不知道，每晚想到睡不著仍不知道，這對我們是另一記打擊。在你讀到這篇文章時，你那里的情況可能會變好，也可能變壞，或者起起落落地從糟糕的情況逐漸好轉，只要你和隔壁的人至少隔著三個吧臺的凳子，并找到戴著口罩小口喝飲料的方式。你是否有親愛的人每天需暴露在風險中？比如說公交車司機、護士、警察、居家照護員、雜貨店店員、肉品包裝工廠的生產線工人？
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