Every Saturday morning, my go-to read in the NYTimes is “Sunday Routine,” which follows a New Yorker around for the day, logging their this&thats. The column ranges from all sorts of humans: Last week was the singer Patty Smyth, the week before was a coffee shop owner in Brooklyn, Zenat Begum, then there was Michael Tennant, the empathy expert, and on like that. Today, a lovely woman named Keisha Gourdet, a home-health aid, was featured. Her story: up at 4.30 AM, leave her husband and kids, board a million forms of MTA transportation, take care of a man in his home, then board a million forms of MTA transportation again to get to her job at a nursing home, complete her many hour’d shift caring for patients, back on the MTA treadmill and home around 1 AM in the wee hours. Husband and kids already asleep. Much PPE and disinfecting of herself during this day because of these COVID times. And on top of that stress. So. Much. Stress. Yet as I read about her day, I could feel her dedication to the patients she serves and the people she works with. This story, one that recognizes a singular woman, is replicated a million times over across the globe by health-care workers doing the heartbreaking necessary work of our time. Inside of the extreme stresses these folx are facing—with some kind of end in sight, yet often those finish lines feels miles away just when you’re closest—the fact that there is still resistance to the simple mask-distance-hand wash troika is stunning, and makes me have to walk away from writing this because I get so angry.

Reading about Keisha, a big ole piece of perspective came and sat right on my soul. Because, I’m not gonna lie to you, a mere five minutes earlier I was whinging on about how the haircut I was meant to get today had been cancelled due to our stylist quarantining after exposure to COVID. Sometime tomorrow all salons/barbers will shutter again as California enters into a lockdown phase much like we had at the beginning of the pandemic. I figure right about now, most everyone (who’s following science, that is) is assessing their surroundings and maybe thinking some form of “WTF. We’ve been at this a very long time.” And wherever those thoughts lead—frustration, sadness, resignation, anger, even maybe some relief at things stripped down to the bare minimum, and/or a combination of all that—it’s really a situation of virus as object lesson. Here we are. The past has moved on (there it went again), future around some elusive corner. Yes, a vaccine is on the way, but many months of patience required for that to be a reality in most our cases. So here we are now. And to all of those who day in, out, rinse and repeat are being the Keisha’s of the world, the least I can do is recognize my privilege and do what I need to stay healthy and out of their way. Perspective, and all!

This NYTimes tracker is super cool, although obviously subject to change as reality morphs around the vaccine’s availability. But to see where you might stand in the line for the vaccine, click on the link and follow the (very) simple instrux. Here’s where I stand: “Based on your risk profile, we believe you’re in line behind 268.7 million people across the United States. When it comes to California, we think you’re behind 31.0 million others who are at higher risk in your state. And in San Bernardino County, you’re behind 1.9 million others.”

If the line in California was represented by about 100 people, this is where you’d be standing:

Starts here (and I don’t know how they knew I was wearing a red full-body leotard today, but hey…):

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Be safe, find some happy—maybe cookies—and on like that. I appreciate you.