I’m zapped.
Thank God this week is behind us. With every passing week, surely we’re closer to the crisis being over, everyone back to work, everything back to normal.
Like everyone, I’ve been focusing every minute on the news, my family, my job. Tackling one thing at a time. Groceries, finances, being at home, doing my job, figuring out dinner, finding something on Netflix, working out, taking a walk, cracking a beer. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Austin is hanging in. He repeats the family mantra: “I ain’t scared, I’m prepared!” as he runs off to wash his hands before getting back to YouTube and Oreos. It’s true – we’re prepared. I was in Silicon Valley the first week of May, quite awake and aware, wearing my mask and buying hand sanitizer on Amazon.
I started this week with a cough. Tuesday it was worse. No fever, but so tired. Weird dreams, no sleep, waking up wondering if I still have it. Should I get a test? Can I get a test? Would it do any good? Many are dying before the results come back, and unless you’re turning blue, they send you home. So all you can do is quarantine.
My affairs are in order. If I die young, die now, well then I’ve made my mark – so be it. But what if I’ve infected my wife and son? I can’t bear the thought. Could I find the strength to will my lungs to continue to breath? I would fight like hell, yes. But that’s like fantasizing you could will your body to swim once you’ve fallen through the ice. There’s nothing to be done. We can only love one another deeply, right now, and find something we can all enjoy on HBO. Maybe tomorrow I’ll shave again so my mask will fit tightly and I can run into the grocery store. So be it.
The cough was lesser today than yesterday, which was better than the day before. Still no fever. Donna and Austin feel just fine. Perhaps I’ve been one of those with the “mild symptoms” and have survived it. Maybe Easter will come and God will lift this nightmare from the Earth, proving his existence with the greatest miracle in all of human history. Probably not, but at least Lent will be over and I can try to order a pizza.
I think I’m not alone in this odd pairing of daily existential turmoil and the mundanity of quarantine. Am I going to die? Do we need grapes? Will our country survive? Where are my socks?
It’s all sure as hell interesting, and has me convinced that we’re all experiencing this, and bound by this, right now. We’ll make it through, we’ll lose a few good soldiers, but the other side of this awful crisis is waiting for us, out there somewhere in weeks and months.
And in that time there will be peace, friendship, and appreciation. And good music, definitely. The Doobie Brothers will reschedule, right?