Bad Old Days

Someday, in the future, people will look back on us and marvel:

In the past, as recently as the 21st century, millions of human beings in the most technologically advanced civilizations got up every day with what were called "colds." They went about their business as though nothing was wrong, though they sneezed profusely, infecting everyone in the room with each blast, and couldn't breathe through their noses. Their throats rasped, their eyes watered, and they gushed mucus like a cheap chocolate fountain at a trailer park Sweet Sixteen party. Their fellow students or workers pretended not to notice. They endured this with remarkable stoicism for a week or more, as though no other way of living was possible. Let us thank the gods we live in our times, not theirs.