To the editor:

I lived in Scotland before returning to Lawrence. Other countries used to be intangible things in books or on the television. However after four years, those intangible, foreign countries took the shapes of my dearest friends.

My friends are a few among the billions on this planet, but prove COVID-19 is not just affecting “other people and places.” A virus does not have a passport. We cannot hide behind borders, blame and fear.

Three friends are quarantined in London. Another is in Edinburgh. Two are in central Oslo. One left Scotland, on one of the last flights back to Taiwan. Another is teaching in the United Arab Emirates; her family is in Austria. Another left London with her sister and mum for the Welsh countryside. Her father stayed behind, a doctor at a frontline London hospital.

My friends and I look and speak differently. However, it is because of them that I know the world to be a beautiful place filled with dreamers just like you and me. I am telling you these stories so you can know a little of the people across the globe too.

While now is the time to distance, we must uphold our duties to the wider community. Support your neighbors; the radius of our impact grows bigger at each stage. With small acts, we can build bridges between cities, states, countries and cultures without ever leaving our homes.

It’s like that earworm theme park song: “It’s a small world after all.”

Kennedy Younger Dold,

Lawrence