The Emperor Is Wearing Vapor Rub

I am the only one in my family, that I know of, who uses vapor rub. In fact, I am currently slathered in it, feeling a bit like I've basted myself in menthol. As you can probably guess, I have a cold. There's not much you can do when you have a cold. You can drink water, rest, sleep more than usual, and take medication to alleviate some of the symptoms. The actual virus, though? Your body has to fight that off alone. I do try to alleviate my own suffering, most notably by taking an expectorant and covering myself in an off-brand "all natural" vapor rub that someone gave me as a gift once. (Truly, my family and friends know me well.) I don't remember the first time I looked up the science on vapor rub— learning that studies seem to show the strong menthol and Wintergreen scent of the product tricks your brain into thinking you're breathing through an unclogged nose, despite doing absolutely nothing to alleviate the situation. It's not a fraud, per se. It's just not the cold and flu panacea most of us were raised to believe in. I know this. I use it anyway. As I lie on the couch feeling a bit like a slightly dried out, mentholated slug, I read the news. Something is always happening, somewhere. If you stay online long enough, you can watch the slow breakdown of societies in real time: Brexit, impeachment, the Amazon rainforest fires, the student loan crisis. I could go on, but I think you've got the picture. There's not much I can do, individually, about these societal issues. Of course, I do what I can. I buy fair trade. I don't do beef. I shun plastic when I can, and not just for the sea turtles. I exercise my right to vote. I write a weekly email to my Congressional representative expressing my displeasure for, well, everything he does. I donate to GoFundMes in an attempt to mitigate the failing social safety nets. Now, I'm not saying any of these things to make myself look good. There's many more things I could be doing to help the planet be a better place, and I will never be free of my own issues. However, all this idealization of living low-waste, voting, writing your senator, refusing plastic straws? Dear reader, I would like to propose this thought: if the world is fighting a virus, all of these individual changes and sacrifices are the vapor rub of society. These things we do can temporarily alleviate some of the symptoms, and they're comforting to us as we go through them. We feel as though we're doing all we can. Feeling free to breathe, even for a short amount of time, is not something to look down upon. I'm not suggesting we stop doing these things! After all, the only way I'm giving up my vapor rub is if someone pries it from my cold, dead hands. I plan to be buried with a tub of it, the way Egyptian mummies were buried with the treasure they wished to take to the afterlife. No, all I'm saying is this: if the world has a virus, we're not treating it. We're alleviating the symptoms, briefly, through smoke and mirrors. We're mentholated and going through the motions as though society isn't slowly crumbling around us. One thing that fascinates me is the spread of foreign state disinformation. I've explained the state of it a thousand times to my husband, who probably wishes I would stop listening to NPR and reading political science blogs who focus on the spread of propaganda and disinformation in public consciousness. It's scary, they say. It's a real problem, they say. But we're used to it, right? After all, we still connect with brands on Twitter who are pretending to be personable and relatable while selling user information, forming monopolies, busting unions, and evading taxes. Companies! They're just like us! This, too, is disinformation. This, too, is why I still smear vapor rub across my chest and hope for the best. On some level, we do know the life we're collectively living isn't sustainable. We're stressed. We're sick. Millenials will have shorter lifespans than our parents. We fight it with wellness programs. We do yoga and green juice and vitamins and consumerism disguised as self-care. These aren't solutions, of course. No amount of hot yoga will replace paid sick leave, and no amount of green juice can erase the stress caused by a lifetime of predatory student loan debt. Still, we daub them across our collarbones and breathe deeper, just for a moment. We switch to "all natural" vapor rub that's coconut oil based instead of petroleum based. Much better. (I pause writing here to reapply. My stuffiness is becoming unbearable.) Now, society probably won't collapse today. It probably won't collapse tomorrow. What we're seeing is a slow decline, where the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer and the Amazon burns, taking our oxygen with it. As evidenced by the climate marches, the #MeToo reckoning, impeachment proceedings, and riots and revolutions throughout the world, people are beginning to move past treating the symptoms. We want to evict the viruses that have taken up space in our collective consciousness. As we continue to gain clearer vision of what is going on around us, we will see one thing: The emperor isn't wearing clothes, but he is wearing vapor rub.