| There have been many deaths and few funerals. The coronavirus has killed one hundred thousand Americans. That number is both vast and insufficient to describe the scale of the country's grief. It is a placeholder for one hundred thousand private tragedies. It is one way to talk about what the country has lost, but it can't fully account for the true cost of one hundred thousand lives brought to an early close. It is a place to start. And it is not the end. More will die, perhaps many more. One of the strangest aspects of the pandemic is it has largely bottled up our grief and kept it hidden behind closed doors. One hundred thousand deaths might in more ordinary times leave the streets looking like one long procession. But for the most part, the streets remain quiet, and families in mourning are alone indoors with the fresh absence in their lives.  As lockdowns begin to ease, as more doors begin to open up, as more people emerge from their long time away from one other, we might begin to recognize the scale of our collective loss. We will notice that a friend we hadn't spoken to in a while, or a co-worker, or someone we used to see on the train, or a friendly clerk at a local store, isn't there anymore. We will once again be on face-to-face terms with our losses. For now, however, all we have to go by are numbers. And marking a tragic milestone is the first step toward understanding its meaning.—Tim Annett | 
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