Do you feel it? Is Covid the one, like the Monsterflu in On a Black Horse, that finally delivers the extinctive event the disaster movies have primed us for?

How will you know the black horse is running?

Do you feel it? The disturbance in the atmosphere… the drop in pressure, a pain behind your temples. The hoofbeats as faint as the first new reports, overseas, a short article buried deep in the daily news. There are reports of deaths, a respiratory virus, the CDC urges monitoring. Life is good and luxuries abound, and you are at the start of a busy day. But you pause, you think. Fear mongers….

The days go by, frantic videos begin to appear, trying to arouse the public. But there’s been so many, Ebola, Marburg, Lassa, the Swine Flu, Avian…and a public numb to the latest disaster sleeps on.

Then the news reports intensify. Rumors of death counts, the closing down of cities in far off lands, the doctors making one last desperate video then blank screen. The metallic taste in your throat…well now we mustn’t panic. Look to those gods, the science and the news, and the
touchstone in your minds says all is well, They (the adults in the room) will get this under control.

We wince away from the sandwich board man, with his lined, sincere face, struggling in a netherworld of addiction with a tender, unhinged mind THE END IS UPON US. Ridiculous and sad.

Then work lets you know that we are staying home today, and the store has changed and suddenly we are trying to think about where the nearest gas station might be…if it comes to that (because it won’t come to that…) right?