Where before people were only allowed out of their homes to get food and medicine, always by themselves, now they could take walks with other members of their own household, jog or do other non-contact sports, and get together with close relatives, as long as social distancing was maintained and masks were worn.
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| "COVID emergency phase 2. Gatherings no, masks yes." |
"The next step, the worst, was when fear and worry began to overwhelm us each time we heard an ambulance siren. (There were so, so many in the beginning.) Each time we watched television there were too many dead, even more people in intensive care units, and the numbers rose every day."
As the two-month lockdown wore on, there was resignation and willingness to obey the government's strictures. "We started to appreciate our new life at home, but we were always waiting for freedom."
Now freedom, or at least a bit of freedom, had arrived, but Franca admitted she had "two conflicting feelings: joy in the little light you can see at the end of the tunnel, and the fear that Corona will come back as before." There is a shadow hanging over everyone, she wrote, "a sadness...I am not really able to understand it...it is like a question that arises spontaneously: are we ready to go back to living in the same way as before? Or have we had time to think about what is really important to our life? Doing less shopping, spending more time with relatives and friends instead of with virtual people or things, really thinking about our planet--how can we stay healthy when the Earth is ill?"
She sent along this video, which some Italian wag had labeled "4MAGGIO2020." Now that May 4 had arrived, she wrote, "I hope we will continue to behave well, respecting the rules the government has given us...not like these chickens!"
On his Facebook page Fidenza's mayor, Andrea Massari, urged his fellow citizens to show solidarity and protect each other. He published the photo at the top of this page with the comment, "One rule is so little. Are two too many?"
He also answered citizens' questions about what the new rules meant. Collecting mushrooms: OK, but only in the daytime and only for your own consumption. Team sports: No. Individual training: OK. Going to a second home within Emilia-Romagna: OK. Going to visit your grandchildren in another region: No.
A few days later he announced a major milestone. Fidenza's hospital, which had been converted to an all-COVID facility and had had some 300 cases a few weeks before, discharged its last COVID patient. It's now once again a full-service community hospital, except for the birthing center, which is scheduled to reopen in June. Massari posted a video showing hospital staff, gowned and masked, dancing in celebration and holding up signs saying, "The future depends on you" and "Behave well."
When I spoke with Pam, she told me how lovely it was to again hear people talking on the big pedestrian street outside her place, where before there was only silence broken by the sound of ambulance sirens. "Last night at 8 o'clock there were kids playing with a ball in the Piazza Grande" next door to her. "They were socially distanced and their parents were keeping an eye on things. It was great to hear kids laughing again."
It sounds like most Fidentini were following the rules, but for younger people just escaping from two months at home, the temptation to ignore them ran high. The mayor posted this photo of three young men disregarding the social distancing regulations.
He added that during the first week of Phase 2 he'd received many stories about citizens who were following the rules. But he'd also received stories "about those who aren't taking the emergency seriously or simply don't care. About themselves or about others. Do I have to repeat myself? I will. If we don't all do our part, we'll return to the starting point, and that starting point was brutal: ambulances continually bringing COVID patients to the hospital."
At least in Fidenza, there doesn't seem to be a lot of talk about an individual's "freedom" to infect others. Instead Massari and citizens on his feed talk about the importance of respecting each other, and showing that respect by protecting each other with masks, gloves, and not getting too close.
Franca acknowledged that this last was going to be difficult, especially for the young, including the many twenty-somethings who still live with their parents and have been cut off from their romantic partners throughout the lockdown. "I don't know how boyfriends and girlfriends that don't see each other for months can stay at a distance," she wrote.
So perhaps it's not surprising that when bars and other social gathering places opened up on May 19, things got a little out of hand. More about that in our next episode.
