Editorial: New heroes arise in pandemic
Share this post:
Hero.
A person admired because of courageous acts or selfless endeavors.
We all know what a hero is. It’s the firefighter who rescues a kid from a burning building or the soldier who falls on a grenade. It’s a police officer who stops a bank robbery.
We recognize the heroes among us the same way we identify the ones in the movies or on television — by their exceptional deeds.
But we have to expand that idea.
It isn’t that those gold-star, medal-around-the-neck, key-to-the-city heroes are any less. It’s just that there is another way to be a hero now. A quieter way that is just as vital and just as lifesaving.
The guy that cuts ham at the deli counter is a hero now. The high school kid who stocks paper towels is a hero, too. The cashier who rings up bread and spaghetti sauce while facing customer after customer, taking their money and handing them receipts.
The fast food drive-thru worker. The gas station employee. The pharmacy counter person. The delivery driver who picks up orders for DoorDash and Instacart and Shipt and anyone else just to cobble together a paycheck from a few dollars in fees and tips.
These aren’t new people in our lives. They’ve always been there. They just didn’t command much attention. Our lowest paid workers have become the modern-day version of staff in a fancy house — relied upon but not really seen.
Coronavirus should change that. We don’t need to be rescued from a fire, but we are trapped in our homes. We ask them to fall on a grenade every day when they go to work and brave a barrage of viruses. We depend on them not to stop a robbery but to connect us to the things we need so that we can stay safe while they aren’t.
And they are getting sick. Locally, stores like Giant Eagle have reported employees testing positive. Nationally, grocery workers are dying.
But stores are still open, still making sure that people can get milk and meat and toilet paper, when available. Those businesses still carrying on are part of what has made the pandemic shutdown work and what is helping the radical efforts to minimize illness and death work.
That is courageous. It is selfless. They are, by any definition, heroes.
And we should acknowledge that. The #LovefromPGH campaign looked to show support for the front line workers — be they medical providers or grocery store clerks or pizza delivery drivers — with lights on all over the city Tuesday night in an “Illumination Ovation.” The event will repeat on Tuesday, April 14.
Lights are beautiful. Appreciation is important. Respect is essential.
If you are one of those people deemed “essential,” one of those who helps us eat or get medicine or get the things that keep us safe in this strange and uncertain time, thank you. You are our heroes.