The Covid Chronicles 

From Cambridge, MA

It’s early morning, and half asleep half awake I feel a dry cough rising up in my lungs along with a Covid panic attack! I struggle into consciousness remembering my seasonal allergies and the calming note from my doctor saying most Covid cases resolve themselves at home with mild symptoms. I pad to the bathroom and take my vitals: pulse-there, temperature-normal, oxygen level-high. It looks like I’ll live another day, if you call this living. I go to the kitchen, and never has it seemed so antiseptically clean, almost like an operating room. Should I be wearing surgical gloves so I don’t infect myself or others at breakfast? A friend announces that he’s spray-cleaning all his vegetables, and I wonder if Lysol poisoning will be the next killer. I wander outside to the rear of our house, normally the site of our lovely summer patio surrounded by flower beds. It’s sadly littered with dead leaves from the long winter, and I wonder if there’s really any point setting it up. My two housemates come out and ask if I need any help, and together we start to clean it up, erect the lattice screen wall, and bring out the furniture from the basement. I get some pansies, and miraculously, the patio comes back to life. It almost seems like an act of defiance, or a sacred ritual—or even a sacrilege in these times of the Covid.

I notice how deathly quiet our street has become. Gone are the laughing yelling teenagers, quarreling lovers, and loud conversations, that now I dearly miss. The heartbeat of the city has seemingly stopped; where is every one? How did we become so afraid of the very air we breathe and share? I feel the need to pierce the silence, so I bring out my boom box and put on Frankie Valli. “You’re just too good to be true, can’t take my eyes off of you!” My neighbor Sal comes to the fence smiling ear to ear. Play it, Al! Hey Al, are you gonna put up the patio lights? I love looking down from my deck at night and seeing your lights. I say, yes, Sal, I’m gonna put up the lights.

We bravely or foolishly decide to have our first barbecue of the season and send out a few invites. There’s room on our patio for social distancing, but will any dare to come? We haven’t seen our friends in over a month and hope for the best, but our expectations aren’t high, as fear grips the land. Will they deem it worth the risk however small in order to satisfy that deep need for direct social contact that we all share? In the end only one brave soul shows up; he brings his own folding chair, parks it in the driveway, and of course he’s wearing a mask. We chat, and after thirty courageous minutes he departs without eating a bite. So the four of us--my partner, our housemates, and I enjoy a delicious meal together in the waning light: steaks, wine, conversation, and laughter. It feels for a fleeting moment...almost normal.

This is our life in the time of Covid.