A moral philosopher remembers his old English teacher, “who worked in what is au fond a profoundly sacrificial profession”

This ordeal is revealing things to us about who we cherish. Our own inevitable winnowing process, who we call versus who we are content to wait to see on the other side, may surprise us. “I didn’t think I would miss her”, we might think. So too, conversely, may other people’s inevitable winnowing processes hurt us. “I thought he would Zoom me at least.”
The ordeal may also be creating space to reflect upon whom we cherish among the departed, and why. My old English teacher has moved from the first category to the second; she was buried last week. I had called Mrs Whitaker to see how she was enduring self-isolation, aged 70. Fine, she reported. A few days later she was out biking when she suffered a massive stroke. By the end of the week she was dead.