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Fall 2020
Gradually the air is growing colder. On my walk today, the sound of crunchy leaves underfoot registered slowly, as if from a distance: While my world stands still, the season is changing. I collect red maple leaves from the street on my way home from downtown, but those left on the trees are slow to turn bright, many more yellows than orange or red. I still count on walking to keep me sane, and I feel better when I have a chore to accomplish—if I have letters or bills to mail or produce to buy at the farmers' market. A few times, I stopped briefly at 10,000 Villages to buy gifts or a special hot chocolate mix, but I avoid other stores.
Everyone is masked now. Signs on the street announce that masks are legally required for anyone entering downtown. Many stores post their own reminders along with the limited number of customers allowed into the store at one time. Once inside, tape on the floor marks six feet intervals where those customers can stand.
At home, the days are indistinguishable one from another, despite responsibilities and Zoom events that ought to differentiate them. I feel as if I'm on a train traveling across a vast landscape, passing valleys, woodlands, cities, and plains at a rate that never varies, and no stops are allowed. Just outside the windows, dire pandemic warnings and fraught election updates scroll past in all caps. Whether news arrives by computer, smartphone, or cable TV, any subtlety is lost in the roiling cauldron of noise. Fear hovers over many of my now remote psychotherapy sessions, even when we don't speak of it directly.
In early November, by chance, a friend visits. It's my first and so far only stop at a coffee shop. While we wait for our coffee, elation erupts around us. The election has been decided! Like a brilliant dream, showers of confetti fill the sky, cars honk their horns, people cheer. Joyful songs boom out on radios, we're dancing in the streets.
Nasty backlash follows. Sickness and death continue their devastating march. But vaccines are passing tests. Darkness descends again, but something has lightened in the air.
By late November, we have significant snow on the ground. It's cold. What to do about Thanksgiving? How could we possibly share a dinner with our children and grandchildren outdoors in close-to-freezing temperatures, all of us masked, and six feet apart? We rarely see them, never without masks and physical distancing. But this is Thanksgiving. We have to figure out something.
Less than two weeks before the date, a huge box holding an elaborate gas grill appears on our front porch—lava rocks set in the middle of a 28" x 28" metal stove/table." Surprise! It's a Christmas gift from my brother!
A gazebo sits in our yard next to the house. This summer we ate take-out dinners there together. We do celebrate Thanksgiving, arranged into three separate pods: my husband and I, our daughter, our son with his wife and daughters. We serve three pizzas bought frozen at Stop & Shop—one vegan, one with extra cheese, one spinach. I carefully ladle hot mulled cider from the crockpot into paper cups. For dessert, we toast marshmallows in the fire, each with our own stick.
Light born from the spirit that day peeks through days growing darker. We make it to the winter solstice. We turn the corner. I'm still alive and well: I know gratitude deep in my being.
Winter 2020-21
Even in the midst of formless unfathomable pandemic time, I strive to remember the joy. I delight in the Christmas star, the Great Conjunction, which I can see outside my window as I lie in bed, my head on the pillow. I delight in the wonder of the anniversary orchid I'd given up for dead only a few weeks ago; now buds swell on two new stems.
I remind myself and my mate to cherish every day, for we don't know how many remaining will be unencumbered by grief, or fear, or helpless rage, or simply burdened by endings—our feeling worn down, mourning ever-diminishing skills, counting on one another to get through.
On New Year's Eve, I reflect on this complicated year now ending. 2020 dawned with enormous promise. In early March, I arrived at an artists residency in Wyoming scheduled for three whole weeks. After five days, we were told to leave: a national emergency had been declared. Pandemic isolation was imposed the day after I returned. Massachusetts schools were shut down for "two weeks," which stretched into months, still without end. I didn't hug my son or my daughter or my grandkids again—not once—for the rest of the year, and now into the next: past late winter, past spring, past summer, past fall. There's no certainty, not yet, not even for life or death. The virus means we don't know if we'll be alive until we can hold one another again.
In these times I feel distracted, spread thin, scattered, unfulfilled, incomplete. Well, of course, I am! Suddenly the endless stream of email is evident—interesting papers, challenging blogs, inspiring poems, adorable kittens, endless notifications and updates from my friends—sugary sweets too tempting to resist, despite my halfhearted restarts toward responsibility.
I don't go anywhere. I read the news. I seek calm amidst frustration, disgust, revulsion, profound moral angst. I rage endlessly at the political system, the tragedy of families hungry, dying alone. I struggle with the moral dilemma of what difference can I make, and when can I make it. Will I ever catch up with emails or the news? Should I even try? Do I care enough about the dying? Could I make a difference for those left behind, enduring their own trauma of separation, knowing that their mother died alone, without them?
I have signed up for conferences and webinars, interesting interviews, with intriguing authors and scientists. I've learned about everyday murderers and serial killers. I've paid for access to more than 40 hours of valuable education, presentations by top scientists, top of the line trauma research. I've made new friends, and yet, except for a short blog post, I haven't completed a single new essay or short story.
I'm still mourning the residency cut short, still thinking, If only I had time.... And that is likely true. The interruptions or other competing items calling for my attention never stop, relentlessly calling. There's no exit but through my own discipline. I have one week open now. Maybe, maybe I'll see if I can turn off the internet and write. Yes! I'll solve the problem of binging on endless information around me by imposing a strict diet of two hours a day and no snacks in between.
Doesn't this make plain how the lack of action outside only makes inside more frantic? Instead of remembering to gas up the car or confirming where I'll meet a friend for lunch, I'm sneaking updates on the Capitol crisis before the next Zoom conference...and where is that link?
Today, I've changed the rules! I choose to accept my weakness. I have a name for it, so it's legitimate: "ADD of the Heart." I have a new condition and a new attitude to go with it. My friends in the online clinical group I joined tell me to let myself be, not to worry about flitting from one thing to another. If I enjoy what I'm doing or I'm simply wandering through the greenery of the internet rather than my back yard, who cares? What's wrong with that?
I see that I stop to respond to people who ask for my help. I stop to check out a recipe, or a flower, or a bird call. I stop to write, as I am now. I want to write more. But I will when I have in mind what I want to say, and I decide it rates priority. "ADD of the Heart." So many shiny objects to follow and delight in. Why complain? I just have to hold on until spring.
Experts warn this period of time is the most fraught. While vaccinations ramp up, the virus remains. Variants multiply. We're still vulnerable. Don't let your guard down, they say.
This month's cold breaks historic records. The Gulf Stream fails to keep Arctic air in place, and frigid temperatures paralyze the south. Houston is colder than Anchorage. In Texas, the electric grid gives way; more devastation follows.
We stay at home. Outside our windows, the world turns white, and watching a snowstorm becomes An Event. I miss walking, but it's not safe. Instead, I shovel the sidewalk. When it's too deep, kind neighbors with snow blowers offer help. Snow covers the ground for weeks. Layers of ice lurk underneath, where the yard dips. We avoid that patch.
The first call came in late January. Would my husband like an appointment at the local VA hospital for his Covid vaccination? A month later he's had both of his shots, and I've had my first. Nationally, inoculations approach 3 million a day.
Now, in the garden, a crocus blooms next to the iris left from last year. Snow drops with white blossoms completely fill a spot between the street and the sidewalk in front of a brick apartment down the block. Despite snow last weekend and nights in the 'teens, daytime highs will pass sixty next week. Spring is on the way. I can see it from here.
