Canadians, as a people, follow the rules. The Stallion likes to tell a joke about it. I don’t happen to think it’s very funny, but that’s one of the things that makes it so hilarious to him.

Q. How do you get 100 Canadians out of a swimming pool on a hot summer day?

A. You say, “Please get out of the swimming pool....” [Ba-dum-CH!']

The first time he told it, it took me a few beats past the punch line to realize I was expected to laugh. I heard it as a simple statement of fact, not a dig by a proudly individualistic American at the deferential character of his northern neighbors.

But in a global health crisis that calls for people to comply with public orders to keep them safe, I can’t shake the feeling that the advantage goes to Canada. I’m hearing from friends on the ground in my hometown Toronto that, a few scofflaws aside, social distancing is generally being practiced with rigor there.

So, I decided to give it a real try on my walk this morning in California, following the social distancing guidelines to the letter. I plugged a podast into my headphones, and started walking. As I did, I noticed all of the accommodations I had to make to maintain the prescribed six-foot personal space we’re all advised to keep in order to reduce the risk of the virus spreading via aerosolized particles from an infected person coughing or sneezing. It isn’t easy.

Exiting the gate at the foot of my yard, I realized that to my right, the person walking a dog in my direction along the narrow path between a hedge and the canal would create an immediate incursion into my bubble. So, instead I turned left. Walking out onto the major street toward the Venice Pier, I saw that it was quieter than it would have been two weeks ago at 7:30 a.m., but far from deserted. There were a few cars, a bus, and a street cleaning plow scraping the sediment out of the gutter after a night of hard rain. I kept to my side of the street to bypass the more-than-appropriate number of people who congregated opposite in a cafe, waiting for their morning coffee, while a few others gathered outside and watched their dogs wrestle at the end of taut leashes.

I heard footfalls approaching behind me only seconds before a man brushed past my shoulder. It would have been an unnecessary violation of my personal space at the best of times, and then he inexplicably slowed to a dawdle in front of me. I scowled and held back to six feet.

Non-essential retail was closed, per state order, with windows papered over or blinds down — reassuringly paused as if for a national holiday, rather than boarded up for a natural disaster. Approaching a sidewalk dotted with pedestrians, I stepped into the mostly empty street to walk along the bumpers of angle-parked cars, past the open door of the still-serving neighborhood market that always has everything I could possibly need. I didn’t step in to check today, but I’m pretty sure they even have toilet paper.

Despite calls for public beaches and state parks to close, Venice Pier beach parking was still open. I had planned to walk the quarter-mile out to the end of the pier, but the structure is narrow enough that I wasn’t sure I’d be able to maintain the gap while passing oncoming pedestrian traffic. So, I stepped out onto the sand, instead.

My eye caught a figure, a lone human being in the middle of the beach, silhouetted against the turbulent tableau of the crashing ocean and stormy sky. We are social animals, and I found myself in a moment of pure instinct taking steps toward that person before I course corrected for an emptier spot. Suddenly, the beach was drenched in melancholy; I broke down.

I don’t like people to see me cry. I try to be stronger than that. Tears are for private moments I can later pretend never happened. But standing by myself in the middle of the beach, I let the tears come. I have never felt so utterly alone as I did just then.

I’m doing my best to stay connected. I spend work days talking on wall-to-wall conference calls. I’ve recently reconnected with dear friends, catching up for hours by phone, text and Messenger. My core group of pals and I are sharing a glass of wine together on FaceTime just about every evening. I spent yesterday evening face-to-face with my immunocompromised friend, and I enjoy a daily conversation with the senior neighbor as I bring groceries or exchange empty food storage containers for full ones.

But still, I miss my boyfriend, who I sent off to care for his 86-year-old mother at the start of all this. I miss my friends, who I haven’t seen in person for weeks. I miss the wisdom of my father, who died in 2001. Nothing feels right. There’s so much missing.

The latest estimates from John Hopkins University indicate there are about 2,000 cases in Canada, with 25 deaths. This is in a nation of about 37 million people – roughly equivalent to the population of the state of California. The federal government there has recently caught up with the aggressive containment moves first introduced in California on Thursday and non-essential businesses in Canada are set to close by Tuesday. In my hometown of Toronto, a city of six million where the confirmed case count is now at 503, the mayor on Monday officially declared a state of emergency that allows him to move quickly on public health and make decisions without council approval.

 Meanwhile, in the United States, there are 46,145 cases recorded today and 582 deaths. If my math is correct, that’s 141 cases per million people in the USA and 53 cases per million in Canada.

But the USA, with about 10 times the population of Canada, has run only about three times as many tests. More than 100,000 tests have been conducted in Canada so far, with public health authorities ramping up to handle as many as 10,000 more per day. Presumably there are victims that aren’t being identified on both sides of the border, but the math says the count is missing a lot more in the United States.

Although I was pretty comfortable last Monday with my decision ride this thing out here, my doubts are back this week. The Prime Minister again this weekend urged Canadians to come home. He said he would be working with the two national air carriers “for the next week” to ensure citizens who want to get home, can get home. What happens after that?

There are considerations other than the virus. Setting the economy, work and health insurance aside for now, I have a vague societal concern lurking at the back of my mind. The United States is the most heavily armed country in the world. Last week, there were lineups around the block at the local gun store here on the westside of LA. A friend went to buy some shells for his shotgun in Michigan and tried multiple sold-out stores before he gave up.

It’s jarring as a Canadian to think of the level of personal armament in this country. For Americans, gun ownership is deep in the social construct of the nation and an affirmation of the core value of individualism. The fundamental right of the people to keep and bear arms is considered essential to the life, liberty and security of the person. It’s different in Canada where it is illegal for a regular person to open carry or conceal carry a handgun. Most people with guns have rifles for hunting — deer, mostly — or for protecting their farm animals from predators like bears or wolves. Guns just fit into the culture a different way.

When I told my American business partner about being alarmed by line-ups at the gun stores, he dismissed it, saying: “Oh, that always happens here. People just want to protect their own stuff. They’re not going to go out looting.”

But for me, there’s something dystopian about a worldview that takes you to the gun store to line up and get a weapon to to protect your stuff in a time like this. I believe that a crisis brings people together to help each other, that heroes step up to perform essential services and neighbors shop for their elder friends who can’t. An American would tell you there’s no reason you can’t have both guns and altruism but I feel a disconnect in those principles, an outsider’s perspective that I know separates me from many of my friends and neighbors here.

And so, under the the weight of all it, I was mid-cry when my phone rang this morning. The business partner. He’s got a wife and young son at home. I was meant to go there for dinner Saturday night and while I’m certain they’re carefully social distancing, the state of New York — the American front, where public officials are leading the battle — has asked households to stay apart, even if they’re family. That’s what these people are to me, so I cancelled. He thinks I’m over-reacting, but I’m worried about the immunocompromised friend and the senior neighbor I’m shopping for. And I’m playing by the rules in an effort to find the right balance. If this morning’s exercise taught me anything, though, I’m not there yet.

I need a hug.