On taking a detour

And come to think of it, positivity pisses me off

Are we just taking a detour? Will we come back to life as we knew it? Or are things going to be forever changed in some ways we can’t predict right now? 

“Is chocolate cake a necessity?” I say to my spouse Janyce while sitting in the car at the Star Market in our town. I’m waiting for her to finish suiting up in the passenger seat.

“Yes, I’d say so,” she says.

“You know the one to get, right?” I say. “The little one, sometimes it has a cherry right in the middle.”

“I know the one,” she says. 

Janyce leaves the car with her gloves on, wearing the white mask we found in the garage, left over from some project in the attic involving insulation. Now it is strapped around the back of her head with two wide elastic bands and covering her entire face below the eyes.  

I’m feeling safe in the cocoon of the car, wrapped in my old fleece cape left over from my breast cancer radiation days, and wearing my new plaid pajama bottoms that arrived from Amazon just this morning. Outside it is cold and windy. It rained today and our dog was restless and needy, maybe because he didn’t get a proper walk the past couple of days. “Let’s just take him with us,” I said, when it became obvious that I wasn’t going to bake. I looked for a chocolate Ina Garten recipe for a long time on my computer at the end of the day today, at the end of another work week. I wanted one that would require the premium cocoa that Maria-Joyce tucked into a small care package she left for us on her front steps. We took it in trade for the groceries we delivered to the same steps earlier in the week.

“Is everything alright?” said Janyce as we were standing in the kitchen. “You seemed happier earlier.”

“Yeah, I don’t know what it is. I was happier earlier.” I said. “I think I need a serotonin boost from the chocolate.”

We listened to the news at the end of the day on the radio like always. Maybe it’s that. I’m waiting for the “surge” in Massachusetts, but I can’t quite imagine what that means exactly. More people will test positive— a lot more people. More people will die. And we’re required to hang out in the house on another Friday night and do something productive with our leisure time.   

I lean back to kiss the dog on his nose and spot Janyce through the back windshield. She is walking fast through the parking lot, coming towards the car with a plastic covered cake in her hands.

“Let me tell you, Star Market has their act together,” says Janyce, opening up the car door and placing the cake on the dashboard. “I couldn’t find the small one, but we can give half of this to Jim.” 

“How so?” I say.

“Everybody has a mask on. Every single employee. And they are enforcing the distance between people,” she says.

“We can shop here then. I never want to go back to Roche’s,” I say.

Last week, I drove my car around the Roche Brothers parking lot. It was a sunny afternoon on a spring day in the suburbs and the parking lot was half full.  I had the window open a crack and the radio playing while I waited as the cars kept pulling up inches beside mine, even though there were plenty of open spots all over the lot. Nobody wore masks, groups of people in threes and fours stood lingering by the side of their cars— and my car. “What is wrong with you people,” I said to myself, while leaning in towards the middle of the car away from the window.

Okay, maybe it was a bit dramatic for me to think that the virus would fly out of that guy’s mouth a few feet away, the one who was standing by his car and scrolling through his cellphone, only to wiggle its way in through the small crack in my window. Maybe I have antibodies now, anyway. But still, it felt useful to be angry. I started up the car and drove down to another part of the parking lot for the second time, watching the doors for Janyce to appear with her shopping cart.

This morning, we took a walk together down our street on the sidewalk, dodging the police cars parked by the orange detour signs and the heavy machinery left on the corners, sidestepping the large pipes lining the edges of our main street. The town left us a note on our front door last week saying the water would be shut off for the day sometime this week. Our town thinks the upcoming surge of the pandemic is a perfect time to shut off the water and work on a construction project.

Are we just taking a detour? Will we come back to life as we knew it? Or are things going to be forever changed in some ways we can’t predict right now? 

In a text message the other night one of my friends said, “This shut in has stripped away all the distractions and exposed things, like the tide going out.”

Another one of my friends said, “The world is different, but it’s also a wonderful chance for me to be different.” 

And still another friend said she is actually content, at least in the immediate moment, happy to have some concentrated time with her daughter and the ability to work on the projects she has been meaning to focus on.

I don’t feel any of those things. No doubt, I’m a bit envious of all the people I know who are finding a way to frame things in a positive light, find a silver lining, figure out a productive use of their time. My family is scattered. All of us are in different houses and towns and states. It’s all I can do to get through a workday staring at my computer and cook a few meals. We’re going to bed at 8pm and slowly getting up closer to 7am lately, nearly 10 hours of sleep. Save for a walk, some wine by the fire, an occasional online yoga class (thank you, Betsy) and some washing of dishes, this is about it. And then I do it again the next day. 

Tonight, I am sitting on my kilim upholstered chair with my feet up on the hassock, by myself, staring at the fire roaring in the wood stove, digging my fork into a slice of chocolate cake with fudge frosting, and watching the flames lap the sides of the glass in a meditative dance. Amanda Palmer said in her Instagram feed today that all she has managed to produce lately is, “sweat, sadness, toast and anger.”  Fucking Amanda Palmer.  I love her.  And I can relate to that.