I’ve always enjoyed landing in Toronto more than any other city. Maybe because it’s close to home but maybe it’s the way the plane descends into the city. Towers crowding the lakeshore, suburbia rushing in waves toward to the CN Tower – ugly up close but an unexpected delight from my airplane window. For me, the city has always existed in layers of steel and concrete and, of course, the humanity that moves in it, through it and around it – a hive that hums even when it sleeps. The vastness of Toronto that shocked my younger self is still here, though it feels smaller now, tempered by my years of traveling the globe.

Carry-on luggage from my business trip safely in hand, I passed through subdued crowds of travelers, exiting border control and back into Canada without incident. No, I haven’t been to China or Italy or Iran. Yes, I feel fine, no fever. Clearance given and out into the open space of the kiss and cry area, flooded with people waiting for their people. My person waited outside in his car, no desire to get up close and personal with our new COVID-riddled world.

I traveled during SARS and H1N1, the accusatory, damning looks if you sneezed or coughed in public, the abrupt step back to block the spray of germs. Alone with a fever and sore throat in a Chicago hotel room, I self-medicated instead of seeking a doctor because a ban from boarding an airplane home was too terrifying to consider. I remember most the aching aloneness, the driving need to be home with people who loved me and would keep me safe from harm. But COVID feels different, seemingly more sinister from the start, more terrifying in the middle – maybe more worrisome because we don’t know where it’s going.

My current trip – a photoshoot – had been planned for weeks, the team already in place, our model flying in from NYC for the day. The wardrobe bought, furniture shipped, shot list set and approved. But still, I was given the opportunity to cancel, to stay home if I personally felt the risk too great. A privilege that wasn’t lost on me, especially considering the potential cost to the company.

Since a business trip to Vegas in January, I’d been consuming every nugget of information on the Novel Coronavirus. My colleagues laughed at my over-use of hand sanitizer, the religious zeal I applied to washing my hands incessantly, my refusal to touch door handles or push elevator buttons. But I still felt confident in my ability to manage the risks of this trip, to stay safe for three days of carefully controlled travel and arrive home unscathed.

Until we landed in North Carolina…

The airport in Toronto had been shockingly quiet for a morning flight. Where there had previously been hoards of people, seemingly from all walks of life, there were now two distinct groups. Business travelers – easily identified by their focused stride and carry-on luggage – and older vacationers. As I watched the white-haired masses stroll past me, I worried about why they were still traveling. Didn’t they know they were the most in-danger group from this virus? Didn’t someone who loved them try to stop them from traveling? Where were they going that was worth risking their lives?

If I thought things were strange in Toronto, they got even more unsettling when we landed.

During our short flight, the WHO declared COVID a pandemic (expected) and the governor announced a state of emergency in his state (not expected). A few hours in the air and the panic buying had begun. Costcos everywhere were suddenly flooded with shoppers stocking up on mass quantities of toilet paper (this one still shocks me) and every imaginable frozen item. By the time I boarded my flight home three days later, police force would be needed to calm the frenzied crowds. Restaurants and movie theatres were just beginning to limit hours – mandatory shut-downs, still a couple of days away. All schools had been closed – most indefinitely. And my contact with COVID, still mysteriously ahead of me, lost somewhere in the melee of the week ahead.

During the photoshoot and evening dinners, I fastidiously washed my hands at every opportunity. During one meal, an old friend came to our table to say hello, sticking out her hand to shake mine. Still in not-wanting-to-be-rude mode, I shook her hand – and immediately excused myself to wash my hands before finishing my meal. But despite my dedication to hand-washing, somewhere between landing and taking off again, I picked up a germ, a virus. Maybe COVID, maybe not.

Twenty-four hours after landing back home in Toronto, I began to feel pressure in my chest, an oppressive headache I couldn’t shake. Thirty-six hours at home brought fever and chills, each breath in delivering an awareness of the unbearable fragility of life. One day breathing is an autonomic response, done thousands of times a day without conscious thought – and the next day an awareness of dragging air in and gratefully releasing it a few seconds later, repeated again and again and again.

Breathe. Deep inhale in. Deep exhale out. Repeat as needed or as able…

The nights that followed were filled with fevered aching, lying beside my husband and worrying about what I’d brought into our home. A call to the local health unit to inquire about testing did nothing to assuage my fears. No, sorry, you’re too healthy to test, your symptoms are not extreme enough. Please self-isolate for two weeks and let us know if things get worse. I hung up the phone and stared at my husband. If I’m not tested, how will they know if I have COVID? What does this mean if others like me call and are told to settle down and self-isolate? Are the numbers worse than what’s in the media? Were they worse all along? Would I have gone to North Carolina, traveled through international airports, eaten at restaurants, shopped in stores if I’d know how deeply this virus had penetrated our world?

The answer is, of course, no. I would not have gambled with my life, with the lives of my family and friends. I would not have traveled to the US if I would have known I would be banned from visiting my mom in the hospital where she’s recovering from a stroke. I’m still shocked at how much larger COVID is in our own communities – how much larger it’s been for a while…

Our new normal – for now

A week into isolation, my husband and I are both recovering. He began to show symptoms a couple of days after me and seems to be rebounding faster. While he is mostly symptom-free and my breathing issues are slowly returning to normal, we have both have lost our sense of smell. We can’t even discern vinegar from water. It’s amazing how tightly taste is tied to smell. Spicier foods have some flavor but so much of our diet tastes bland. When we eat, it’s as if we’re reliving the memories of how things once tasted rather than how they taste now.

We’re feeling better and walking outside – staying safely away from others, of course. And it strikes me how many people are doing the same thing – and how many say hello when passing by, a new, delightful development in our busy, fast-paced world.

The responsibility – and yes, luxury – of staying home and self-isolating makes me painfully aware of the people in our world who can’t do the same. Healthcare workers, yes, but so many more we don’t see. Without people, fuel isn’t delivered, cars and trucks and airplanes stay parked. Without people, food goes bad, rotting in warehouses and the transfer of desperately needed medical supplies is halted. If no one works at the power plants or substations or removes fallen trees, the lights go out. The power behind everything we rely on today, from the Internet to fresh water from our faucets, is people. Healthy people.

Despite how we constantly bemoan the impersonality of the modern world, our cities are built on a massive but delicate infrastructure of people – and it’s the people that matter, the people that keep us going forward in life.

If you think staying home and self-isolating might save someone’s life, you’re right. But the life it might save could be your own – because you won’t be spreading the virus to someone who keeps your lights on or provides the medical care you need to survive.

I will never stop wanting to travel, to see more of this big, beautiful world, which can sometimes feel small when a plane will take me anywhere I want to go. And I’ll never tire of breaking through the clouds on my return home to Toronto. Seeing the CN Tower, proudly standing watch over her beloved city of steel and concrete. And people, so many people with hopes and dreams and love to share with each other.

Self-isolating and social distancing are the best only tools we have to protect each other during these unprecedented and unsettling times. And make no mistake, protecting each other is our duty. We are guardians of each other, stewards of each other’s lives and yes, our lives are truly in each other’s hands. For now, my husband I are staying home where we can heal – where we can ensure the virus we had dies here with us. God willing, travel will be a part of our lives again and we can look forward to coming home again and again and again…