Fortunately, my teenage son was ahead of the curve, seeing this moment coming before scientists recommended action and face coverings became fashionable.

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I wore a face mask to Publix last week. Not a surgical mask. Not exactly a homemade one, either. It’s black and has a kitten nose drawn on it in white.

My 19-year-old son bought a 10-pack of anime-themed masks from a seller on Amazon on March 11. He saw what I couldn’t that day. This was going to be a thing, wearing masks. You wouldn’t want to be caught without one.

These were the only ones he could find — but he rather likes their style. There’s one with a menacing white zipped mouth on black cloth. Teenagers.

When he wore his mask to Publix weeks ago, he got the eye. Possibly back to the menacing art. Or because masks weren’t a thing then.

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But in the dairy aisle last week, my kitten nose didn’t raise any eyebrows — and really, about a third of the folks in the aisles had something over their faces, too, so eyebrows were all I could see of them. Most had some sort of medical-looking mask. One guy had a plaid flannel shirt tied around his face. We all kind of nodded at one another. We get it — or rather, we don’t want to get it.

We’re just waiting for everyone else to catch up.

Maybe then it won’t feel so awkward. (It will likely continue to feel humid, though. Face-hugging, fog-your-glasses muggy.)

The key: Gaining buy-in

The morning I went shopping, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the president and the surgeon general still were mulling over the wearing of masks and telling others to do so.

I expected at any moment President Donald Trump would appear on TV or Twitter or both, advising the American public that it’s time to don masks. I was curious how hard of a sell this would be. How quickly would my neighbors or the strangers hovering over the Publix produce buy in?

The CDC weighed in by that evening, erring on the side of something is better than nothing. I’m still wondering about the time to buy in.

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Before I’d even headed for the grocery store, the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, donned a mask — also black cloth, but no anime sketch on it — and proclaimed to the 4 million residents of that city should do the same. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio was on board, too.

Trump, in the hours after the CDC’s advice, did indeed take to the airways: "This is voluntary. I don’t think I’m going to be doing it."

(Of course, he probably won’t be shopping at Publix, either. And we’ve been told the people who come within 6 feet of him are tested first.)

The experts say buying in will depend on who you trust — and I don’t mean just the people you see at news conferences or on TV.

In my house, in hindsight, I’d say, trust the 19-year-old who by early March had spent weeks obsessing over the news out of China and had read every research paper he could find online.

He had quite reasonably, logically, argued why would the government say masks are ineffective and also say not to use them because then you threaten the supply for health-care workers and first responders who do? If they’re so pointless, why tell people caring for the sick to wear them?

I can’t believe he, and not I, the journalist, was the first in my house to cry BS.

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If I’m to be honest, part of me was nodding in agreement. Good points.

But I also bought into the other messages: People don’t wear masks properly. They handle them in a way that puts hands to face more often and creates more threat than protection. They work best on the sick, preventing their germs from spreading. They aren’t so great at protecting the healthy.

But who are the sick? And do they even know it?

The governor of Georgia declared last week that he just learned that people without symptoms can spread coronavirus. But Google it. That’s been a concern before COVID-19 showed up in the U.S.

Dr. Anthony Fauci added an exclamation point for any doubters Sunday night, when he told America that 25 to 50 percent of people with the virus could be unwitting carriers.

The CDC referenced that research in its change of tune last week:

"We now know from recent studies that a significant portion of individuals with coronavirus lack symptoms ("asymptomatic") and that even those who eventually develop symptoms ("presymptomatic) can transmit the virus to others before showing symptoms. This means that the virus can spread between people interacting in close proximity — for example, speaking, coughing, or sneezing — even if those people are not exhibiting symptoms."

It can spread in conversation.

Perhaps the heroes on the street are the ones wearing masks.

No one’s arguing the public should don N95s or even surgical masks. We really do need to save those for the front liners, our leaders concur. But, it turns out, stitching a double layer of T-shirt or bedsheet does provide something.

Make sure it’s woven cloth — so not spandex — and the tighter the weave, the better.

On Saturday, Gov. Ron DeSantis had a scheduled call with the CEO of the Jo-Ann Fabrics stores. Seriously. What do you think they were talking about?

Making masks and statements

Getting the public to make masks hasn’t been a huge challenge. Virtual sewing clubs are taking Facebook by storm. Sew Face Masks Philadelphia has 3,700 members Florida Mask Makers formed two weeks ago and is up to 454 members.

Former Energy Secretary Rick Perry was asking for elastic donations because his 91-year-old mom is sewing them. The Palm Beach Post has covered more than one homebound mask maker in the past weeks.

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Mostly, they’re making them for health-care workers, or people on the front lines — including, according to one Florida mask maker, her Amazon delivery guy.

But getting the public to wear masks?

When the news of this coronavirus came out, so did pictures from China. Everyone there was wearing masks. Wearing masks in public is something that we tend to associate with Asian cultures, even when a pandemic isn’t threatening.

There’s a history of wearing face masks in Japan and other east Asian countries that dates back at least decades and is attributed to everything from allergy precautions to ways to battle pollutants.

Asians have also had to grapple with a variety of other contagions, including SARS, which boosted mask-wearing in the early 2000s.

Certain researchers who’ve tackled the issue say there may be philosophical underpinnings as well. Mask wearing is a courtesy that keeps your germs from infecting those around you.

Government advisories. Mass media. Good marketing — masks as fashion. All take some credit in influencing the public from South Korea to Hong Kong.

Whatever it is, the demand for disposable personal face masks has leaped into the billions in the 21st Century and now tops 4 billion a year in Japan alone, according to the Japan Hygiene Products Industry Association.

But really, seeking to curb contagion by having everyone mask up isn’t without precedent in the U.S. You just have to go back to San Francisco during the spread of the flu in 1918. City leaders made wearing a mask mandatory in public. They launched a publicity campaign with the Red Cross. They wrote songs about mask wearing. According to CNN, one ode to the cause featured the lyrics: "Obey the laws, and wear the gauze. Protect your jaws from septic paws."

They tapped the social influencers of the day: judges and leading politicians and featured them in masks on the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle.

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The campaign caught on in other cities too. Soon, they, too, were encouraging sewing parities. They also cracked down on scofflaws with fines and threatened jail time.

No one’s threatening jail time here.

I have seen Queen’s "Bohemian Rhapsody" co-opted in the name of quarantine and handwashing. I’m sure I just haven’t searched long enough to find the face-mask song — but I did see a video out of China titled "Man uses drone to persuade villagers to wear masks in China." Funny, but I digress.

While Trump isn’t wearing one yet, his wife Melania is advocating it.

The influencers of today? Maybe designers. So far, Prada, Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent and Balenciaga all say they will be manufacturing face masks. (Don’t shop in that stratosphere? H&M Group is doing it, too.) Their aim is to supply health-care workers, but their statement might translate to the man on the street, much as their fashion does.

And our favorite movie and music stars are getting into the act as well.

In the last two weeks, Jennifer Garner and her son went out for a bike ride with helmets and masks. Renee Zellweger grocery shopped in one. Demi Lovato has a sleek black version — definitely not homemade. Justin Bieber wore one too.

By Sunday, I thought maybe the tide was turning here in Palm Beach County.

I, too, was out again in my kitten mask. This time at Trader Joe’s for some cold brew coffee to tide me over for the next couple of weeks. A line stretched out the door (standing on blue-tape X’s so that we socially distanced ourselves), seven of the last 10 people in line had some sort of mask covering their faces. Inside, more customers than not and several cashiers wore them, too.

I found myself smiling, signaling to the world that I was with them. We were in it together. And then I remembered. Oh, yeah. They can’t see my smile. At least, my mask was smiling, whiskers and all.

sisger@pbpost.com

@sonjaisger