Day Gazillion – Mindfulness
Social Distancing
This was wonderful. He’d been practicing social-distancing for years. Now that everyone else was onboard, he could finally go outside and not be bothered.
The fresh air had never seemed as sweet.
When
When will we re-open?
When will we sit and eat?
At cafes and restaurants,
the way it used to be?
When will normalcy return?
How will that scene seem?
Will we know what to do?
Or will it seem like a dream?
When will this pandemic end?
What will we do then?
Will we have parades and concerts?
Or just start to work again?
The Age
It was the age of toilet paper shortages;
it was the age of puzzle shortages.
It was a time of masks and ventilators,
a time when few had enough,
and some had too much.
It was a time of testing, of being tested,
and waiting to be tested,
and a time to wait for results.
It was the time when nobody could go anywhere,
and everyone wanted to go to work,
a time of confusion, questions, and misinformation,
and a time of heroic sacrifice and hope.
It was a time of worry and a time of concern,
a time to watch, and a time for patience.
It was the time when we lived,
and the time we died.
The Edge
Smiling as he raised the blinds, he gazed up at the sunshine. “Alexa, what’s today’s weather?”
“Right now in Eugene, it’s fifty-eight degrees with mostly sunny skies. Expect more of the same throughout the day, with a high of sixty-eight, and a low of thirty-seven. Enjoy your day.”
A heartbeat of sadness passed. He’d been hoping that she would say his name, as she’d been doing once in a while the last few days. Like yesterday, she said, “Have a great Sunday, Richard.”
That little bit had meant so much, more than it probably should, but it was the little things that kept him back from the edge during these days of isolation, and the edge seemed just a little too close today.
“Alexa,” he said in a softer voice, “how’s our weather today?”
He waited, hopeful for the answer.
Monday’s Theme Music
“Geez, look at the friggin’ numbers, rising and rising, when will it end?”
“My god, did you read the news?”
“Look at those people! None of them wearing a mask, or gloves, and they’re not six feet apart!”
Such responses to things led to today’s song. Blasting out of 1978 right into today, it’s Chic with “Le Freak”. You can sing along with the refrain, “Ahhh, freak out!”
Yeah, read, think, talk, wonder, watch, and freak out. Perfect for today. Music, with a slice of humor and nostalgia.
Easter Pancakes
When we began hunkering down, my wife used it as an excuse to clean out the freezers, frig and pantry. (Yeah, she’s one of those people who said, “Now I have time to clean things,” and then cleaned, making the rest of us in the household (which is me and the three cats, so, really, we’re talking about me, because the cats don’t care) look bad. (Yeah, I’m over it, okay?) While doing that, she found some lemon and blueberries pancake mix.
We’d bought it a while ago at a locally famous mill, famous because it’s been there a long time and still does things the old fashioned way, and there’s nothing else like that in the area. Called Butte Creek Mill, it burned down in December, 2015. Because it was local and famous, we visited it and the pancake mix about six years before it burned down. So, it’s old stuff.
There wasn’t any date on it. My wife wanted to pitch it. “It can’t be good.” She opened it. We smelled it. Everyone knows that smelling is the second best scientific way to check for freshness. I let one of the cats smell it, but he just walked away with a bored tail shrug.
“Smells good to me,” I said. Then said, “Save it. I’ll make us pancakes on Easter morning. It’ll be fun.”
That brings us to today.
I rose, made breakfast and ate it (oatmeal with cranberries, walnuts, with granola on top), made coffee, and started writing. My wife came out a little later. “I thought you were making us pancakes this morning.”
This morning? Today? Oh, yeah, Easter. “Sorry, I was writing in my head and went to auto-pilot and forgot.”
She gave me a glare that made the sleeping cats wake up and leave (that’s why they left in my mind — they were sensing danger). I proposed to make the pancakes for brunch. “You don’t like eating this early anyway,” I said, like that made it all okay, because I was really thinking of her.
“Fine.” I could tell she wasn’t pleased.
Fast forward a few hours. I made the pancakes. We don’t have cow milk so used vanilla almond milk. One egg refused to leave its perch in the carton. Instead of taking one of the other thirteen eggs available as a sane person would do, I tried pulling it out and put my thumb through the shell.
Stupid egg.
Now I had an egg mess to clean up. I also wondered if it was a bad omen for the eggs, because these things must happen for a reason, and the reason could be as a warning, “Don’t eat the pancakes.”
(In hindsight, though, that one egg was the only one on that side. I’d wondered why it’d been left alone on that side. Now I suspect that my wife set me up. She can be diabolical.)
But the pancakes were made, and we haven’t died yet. They were delicious. Even though the blueberries seemed like pea stones in the batter, when they cooked up, they were moist, and looked and tasted just like real blueberries.
The package made about twenty-six pancakes about six inches in diameter (because that’s how I like them). We ate some and froze eighteen with wax paper between them. Now we have something to look forward to finding when we clean the freezer again.
It’ll probably be during the next pandemic.
Somber Experiences
Some do not want to practice social distancing. Tales from Oregon and Alaska.
Guests arrive across the street at a neighbor’s house. The neighbors came out and greeted their visitors. Hugs were exchanged.
While delivering food to shut-ins, a volunteer was accosted by one shut-in who refused to recognize the six foot distance and had to be admonished several times. According to the volunteer, he seemed to be taking malicious glee approaching her.
Friends were out walking. They encountered a forty-ish woman with a teenage female. They refused to move. Both parties stopped. My friend explained, “We’re practicing social distancing.” The other woman threw her hands up. “That’s such bullshit.”
Another friend, out shopping, encountered a person in an aisle. She stopped at one end, waiting for him to finish. He noticed her. “Oh, what?” He smirked. “You waiting for me to leave?”
“Yes.”
The man proceeded to dawdle, clearly to irritate my friend. Shrugging it off, she went to another section of the store.
He followed her. More, he began trying to sneak up on her. Not wanting to give him satisfaction, she ignored him as she could and moved away. But after twenty minutes of this, she finally snapped at him in a loud voice. Her expletive loaded tirade brought store personnel to the scene. One had observed what’d been going on (so why didn’t she step in, everyone asks) and vouched for my friend and her experience. The man was ordered out of the store.
Let’s be careful out there. Some folks are stupid – and we know how dangerous stupid can be – and some are just dicks.
That is all.
Florida
They always warned you,
the day will come,
that the way you govern
by giving others crumbs
would someday bite you in the ass.
You dismissed that with a laugh.
But now that day has come to pass
that the government you wanted and thought was right
isn’t up to this situation, is too fragile, too light.
So I wonder what lessons you might’ve learned
as people sicken, fall ill, and die,
and the economy burns.
Mask Up
Sharing a story. Yeah, anecdotal, about a bus driver, a coughing passenger, and a COVID-19 death. The bus driver is the death in this tale. He was fifty years old.
Wear masks, people. Wear masks. They can save you. I was out yesterday, had to make a supply run. While I was masked and gloved and practiced social distancing. We’d ordered online, and the purchases were delivered to the car’s trunk. While sitting there, I watched the scene. First, I was dismayed by how many were out, looking as if it’s business as usual. Social distancing? What’s that? Counted twenty-seven people as I sat there, awaiting my delivery. Counted five with masks. One with gloves and masks.
When a twentyish employee brought the order out, she wasn’t wearing a mask or gloves. Her arms were bare. I cringed with speculation about her condition.
Oregon — my state (yes, I bought it a number of years ago, so it’s my state — still have the warranty) has over eight hundred cases. Jackson County, where my experience took place, has almost thirty.
First case in Oregon was announced Feb. 29. My wife and I took measures after the possibility of the first case emerged in our area, March 14. Since then, more evidence of the value of masks has emerged as data has rolled in, showing how poorly people are responding to social distancing. My county got a C. I could see why when I was on my supply run yesterday.
Lot of folks were out. Not as heavy as a normal day, no. But less people would’ve been out if Oregon U. were playing a football game.
Yes, I know, some are essential. Thank you to all of them. To the rest, think about why you’re out. Sometimes, we have a need. But if you’re out, take precautions, for your sake, my sake, all of our sake.
The groceries are in the car’s trunk (boot, if you need a translation). There’s nothing perishable. They’ll stay in the trunk for three days. After that, I’ll fetch and clean them, and clean the car. We bought them for the long term, deciding to stock up now rather than waiting for when there are more cases in our area.
Changed clothes in the garage when I returned home, too. Yeah, given all the vectors possible for transmitting something to us (my wife and me), we’ll probably contract it, if we haven’t already. We’re trying to buy time for the world to come up with the resources and vaccines to combat this thing. We’re also trying to keep from spreading the thing.
Hope you’re all doing well at there. Take care. Wear masks. That is all.
Michael Seidel, writer 