Not on the Calendar

What an endearing study in optimism! As I began my January ritual of transcribing known dates from the previous year’s calendar to the new, I smiled wistfully at the profusion of plans cramming the squares in January and February of 2020. Those months held the usual allotment of birthday reminders, appointments, taxes due, and dinner dates. The emotional stew of the times was unstated but represented in times and days marked for the Democratic debate on Jan. 14^th and the Women’s March on the 18^th. 

 

The page for March promised a getaway with dear friends at The Griswold in Essex, an Easter visit from our son’s family, and a trip to visit my sisters and their men in the Poconos.  But when the Coronavirus took over the news and our lives, I scrawled “QUARANTINE – COVID” in bold black ink over my neat notations from the 16^th on. 

 

Those early days of lockdown were surprisingly full. Zoom and FaceTime calls with friends and family could take hours. Fortunate as we are to live amid woods, farms, and open space, Dave and I took long walks every day. I was working on photo books to commemorate a variety of milestones: my sister’s 60^th birthday, my son’s 40^th, and 45 years of marriage to Dave. Immersion in nostalgia, perusing decades of change, holidays, and vacations, eased the pain of losing real-time togetherness. 

 

In March and April, scoring a can of Lysol or a package of toilet paper was a triumph. Word had it the Coronavirus was lurking on every milk carton, soup can, and box of Cheerios, so even a rare trip to the grocery store seemed a courageous, death-defying expedition. Life itself was dramatic. In our fear of disease and sadness at missing loved ones, we were living history in a way we thought had passed with the plague and Spanish Flu.  

 

For a time, humans seemed to be uniting and rising, resilient and brave, to meet the crisis. We were uplifted by John Krasinksy’s moving clips on “Some Good News,” viral videos of Italians singing from balconies, and, in America, grateful citizens applauding First Responders. But resolve was tested as cases and deaths continued to rise. This was bad, and it was not going away, but not everyone believed that. 

 

George Floyd’s brutal murder was not on my calendar, nor the Black Lives Matter march I attended with my friend Joanie. Dave, Joanie, and I participated in Easton’s vigil as well, but that was not on my calendar either. These events were shocking and pivotal, but like all news and activities following March 16th, they happened with little or no warning.  I am not a spontaneous person, and this was an excruciating lesson from 2020: anything can happen. It can happen suddenly, and it can happen to us.  COVID, witnessing George Floyd’s murder, and upended political norms shattered the illusion of stability and immunity to the suffering and injustice others endured. 

 

June’s page still bore residue of my naive assumption that plans made in advance could be penned in ink: two weddings, a stay at the General Warren Inn in Pennsylvania, and a family reunion in Rhode Island. The lockdown was soon ending, but continuing COVID cases and social distancing prevented large gatherings, and all were cancelled. Nice weather, however, as well as time with friends and evenings out on restaurant patios was a boost, and for me, there was a certain peace in having no expectations. Deep gratitude for health, friends and family, and the beauty of the natural world was my daily infusion. 

 

Not until July and August did my calendar’s emptiness reflect our new “Why bother? Better not” approach to any attempt to plan ahead. The early weeks of frequent Zoom calls and frantic doomscrolling gave way to slow days that evolved as they would. Beyond the pandemic and unfolding craziness on the political stage, my brother-in-law, Steve, was losing his cancer battle. Our pod enlarged to include his family, and our time was spent seeking to cheer, help, and bolster each other.  None of this made the calendar. 

 

Knowledge of COVID’s manner of transmission had improved, and we felt greater confidence in the steps we took to stay well, but the election was on the horizon and wearing or not wearing masks was almost as visible a declaration of values and party affiliation as a bumper sticker or street sign. Again, there was an unnerving realization that history’s agonies could repeat. I thought we had learned from past horrors, but no. America was sick and torn. Plus, colder weather and a return to hiding loomed ahead, along with the certainty of Steve’s passing. 

 

I do not put death dates on my calendar.  The indication of a loss appears in the way I mark a person’s birthday. In 2020, November 15^th and January 22nd said, “Ma’s Birthday” and “Steve’s Birthday.”  This year will be different, almost cheerier in appearance: “Happy B-day Ma!”  “Happy B-day Stevie!”    

 

For most of my adult life, my Lang Folk Art calendar has been my guide and personal assistant. Beneath scenes of charming villages, rolling hills, grazing cows, and rustic barns, its memo-filled boxes have kept me on track and on time, and I checked it every day. COVID killed the need for that routine… along with 356,000 Americans and counting. Besides, it seems some of the most significant elements of life escape calendar documentation.  Events and dates are recorded, but the love, fury, power-lust, grief, idealism, and emotional evolution that drive them rarely make the page. 

 

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Breaking (my heart) news: as I write, the Capitol has been breached by Trump supporters seeking an overturn of Biden’s election. The President responded belatedly by telling the rioters to keep the peace and go home. He said he loves them.  He reiterated his claim that he’d won the election by a landslide. During the Black Lives Matter protests, Trump mobilized a massive militarized police force and scattered protesters with tear gas and rubber bullets so he could do a photo op in front of St. John’s Church. Today, windows were broken, the Constitutional work of Congress halted, and Congress members threatened before reinforcements for the Capitol Police were called in. My heart is pounding. My calendar marked today’s Congressional confirmation of the electoral vote, but the horror of the day’s events, sudden and dismaying, could not have been foreseen. 

 

I take that back.  Given Trump’s rhetoric, I could’ve marked this on my calendar.

 

 

      

 

  

A Chance

Deeeeeep breath. Oh, that feels good. Lately, I remind myself to drink in that air, purer than it was a month ago, as deeply as I can, and thank God I can do so. It makes me heady, actually, the blessing of lungs that fill and swell my chest, fueling my cells. As we are forced into retreat by COVID-19 for fear of losing that life-giving ability, our fellow creatures and the planet itself are taking a restorative sigh of relief. 

 Ahhhh, they're gone…  

The charming image of dolphins reclaiming the canals of Venice is fiction as it turns out. A shame, as I’d like to think fake news applies primarily to reports Trump deems uncomfortable. Disappointing as is the dolphin fable, I’ve seen videos of turkeys strutting Boston’s thoroughfares, a mountain lion leaping onto an urban wall, and wild boar snorting and scuffling along an Italian street. Our exploitation and disregard for Nature’s children, human and animal, is a deep sadness, and I hope this respite results in responses that give all species a chance.  

Here in quarantine, my thoughts and moods circle, at times like the mythical Venetian dolphins, leaping with energy and hope, and at times like the haggard wraiths working COVID wards, swathed in masks, scrubs, and flimsy yellow gowns. It depends on the moment. I can be engrossed in a project, comfy and content, while Dave pours me a glass of wine and cooks up a tasty red sauce, or, usually at night, a tickle in my throat conjures the haunting specter of failing lungs and desperate prayers for a free ventilator.  

On this Earth Day, snug at home, I know what’s critical for my survival.  My loved ones and hugs, a treasure I’ve indulged in with abandon, never imagining they’d be forbidden, top the list.  Daffodils, sunshine, magnolias, and birdsong have proved essentials in braving hug-deprivation and CNN reports. Given the leanings of the current administration and man’s enthusiasm for dominion, I’ve worried about my other priorities a lot longer: a thriving animal kingdom, clean air, clean water, and planetary systems and seasons operating as they should. 

It’s hard to imagine that, in the midst of a respiratory crisis, an administration would whittle away at the Clean Air Act, even casting covetous eyes on the provisions of legislation guarding the nation’s waters, but, believe it. The same is true of the Environmental Protection Agency and Endangered Species Act, since 1970, the efforts of past administrations to keep Creation on track. 

In 1989, TIME magazine diverged from human-centricity to designate our Endangered Earth, Planet Of The Year. In the lead article, writer Thomas A. Sanction asked, “What on Earth Are We Doing?” as page after page depicted floods in Bangladesh, slash burning along the Amazon, species extinction, and mountains of refuse. After all these intervening years of alerts, still we face those issues, along with COVID deaths, locust plagues, scorched koalas, hunger, and wildfires. Indeed, one must ask, what is our problem? 

This week, Dave and I watched “One World, Together At Home,” a concert coordinated by Global Citizen and Lady Gaga to benefit the World Health Organization from which our president just withdrew funding.  We were drawn by the lengthy, extraordinary list of participants: Paul McCartney, Keith Urban, Lizzo, Billie Eilish, Beyonce, Celine Dion, Andrea Boccelli, Stevie Wonder, Taylor Swift, Elton John, and the Rolling Stones among them. It filled my heart that they had chosen to support the WHO and give us their music, their best gift, to cheer us in isolation and applaud those on the front lines. 

The program was a hug in itself, a message of unity, caring, and gratitude in our time of trouble. Throughout the show, I fought back tears at clips of medical personnel, first responders, sanitation workers, delivery drivers, and cashiers, some we’ve always admired, and some routinely overlooked, and all have dedicated themselves now to healing and helping. 

Even in my sorrow and anxiety over this disease, I feel the Universe has taken extraordinary measures to give us a chance. Noting that prior warnings were inadequate, this push-back is impossible to ignore, and the answers are apparent in fresh air over Beijing, free movement of wildlife, and the surge of kindness, love, and appreciation among men. I pray we reflect, learn, hold onto the good, and take action.

Happy Earth Day.