When Bubbles Burst

Thoughts About Thanksgiving

When my grandkids were little, they loved to blow bubbles. Whenever we visited the three Indiana grandchildren, weather permitting, we brought bubbles for them to play with on their back deck. The combination of excitement and sibling rivalry often resulted in their bubble streams crashing into each other, some bubbles merging with others to create very large bubbles or bubble clusters while other bubbles burst under the onslaught.

The notion of Covid bubbles strikes me as similar. The members of your bubble of safe people also include all of the people they have in their bubble. The numbers add up. It’s much more exposure than you think you have. A friend of ours, a retired physician lecturing other medical professionals about Covid bubbles, shared this illustration with us, contrasting the bubble you think you have, basically your nuclear family, with other bubbles that envelop members of your family. As the picture indicates, one contagious person a few bubbles away can burst into your bubble.

Farhad Manjoo discussed this phenomenon in The Contacts of My Contacts (New York Times, November 22, 2020). He explained why getting together with anyone outside of your…