Wide Open Spaces Big Benefit Now

To the Editor:

While folks sheltered in place during the pandemic, some took time to slow down and reassess their lives. Online Bible studying, in-depth cleaning and/or organizing, learning to cook or making home improvements were a few pastime activities. Spending more time with children was a plus.

I hope folks will reassess the idea of living on top of one another. It is too easy to spread disease or allow filthy conditions to grow and fester. New York City and New Jersey, the most densely populated state, appear to be the hardest hit by COVID-19. I don’t think people were intended to live in crowded conditions; 16 inch rats in colonies of 40 to 50, perhaps. Some New Yorkers have come to that conclusion and are leaving.

There are ‘self-deluded elitists’ who believe people should be ‘nudged’ into large urban areas or human settlements making it easier to ‘control’ society. I don’t think that will worked out well. Human nature is what it is. Remember the chaos of the Northeast electrical grid failure due to a squirrel? People were stranded in hot, crowded elevators for hours and those who lived in high-rises had to climb many flights of stairs to return to their hot apartments and condos. Leaving their homes after dark wasn’t a safe thing to do. Full power was restored to the City two days later, August 16, 2003. After Hurricane Sandy, people with damaged homes were afraid to leave them to buy supplies. Youths from the surrounding tenements looted homes or physically robbed the owners.

I hope the powers who think large urban areas are the way to a controlled planned society see the wisdom in changing their collective minds. (United Nations Sustainable Development policy).........Give me ‘flyover’ country any day!

Carol Kelly La Grange