Sheltering in Place – Day 10 – Truths

Wednesday, 25 March, 2020

So ‘everyone’ is in the same boat. It would be interesting to find out more about what people are doing differently than I am and learn from it. I’ve read some great Tweets, Instagram posts, articles, stories, and blogs but I’d like to look behind the public face and see the private realities.

I’m apparently ‘vulnerable’ due to age so I have stayed indoors since the afternoon of March 15th.

But my day is getting up, taking the pills that stop my stomach from quaking, standard two cups of tea and the usual breakfast, do some online work or don’t, exercise my knees, a short meditation, one or two hours of cleaning or tidying, prepare a simple meal, watch some TV or streaming, email or chat with friends near and far.

On my list – not yet written on the board propped by the lamp – brush up my French, improve my Italian, start a new doll that symbolises my dreams, attack my worrying backpile of taxes, clear out my clothing drawers, actually read the books I haven’t opened enough, start collecting important things so people (and I) can more easily find them – let me get back to you when I wrap my brain around getting that board written on. This seems a pathetic list, looking at it now. Where’s my great novel? Where’s the bodybuilding, the study of something amazing, the saving of humanity from my upstairs flat? Sigh.

Tell me the ideas will come.

But truth number one – I actually have enough to do. See above.

Truth number two – I don’t care all that much about my hair. I am a curly girl. My hair and how it curls (or doesn’t) consumes a lot of my time. Well, maybe not that much, but more than it does yours…I think. Sitting here, though, in my living room, not even on camera for any reason, I’m paying it no mind. It’s pinned up on my head out of my way, ignored, not for anyone’s eyes. And who cares what I wear? Not me…yet. There are more important things to do with my time.

Sitting outside — Once a day for 15-20 minutes I sit outside getting some ‘fresh’ air. Note my coordinated outfit.

Truth number three – I’m not reading about restaurants. I mean, why bother. Can I go to them now? No. Can I go to them when all this is over? Who knows. What will we talk about on Chowhound and Hungry Onion? We can reminisce about all the great and not so great meals we’ve had. We can talk about or photograph our lunches, our dinners… and sites like Eater and the rest – what will they do? One by one the restaurants closed until they were ordered to do so. One by one the pick up they offered died. One by one the deliveries they clung to evaporated. In which universe did we imagine the likes of McDonalds to the venerable haute cuisine palaces of the world would just shut their doors, maybe forever? How will we rise from these ashes? And how many emails will I receive that contain the words, It is with a heavy heart…?

Casablanca closed — For the very first time ever, local legend Casablanca is closed. This is positively astounding.

Truth number four – People: some step up and some disappoint me. There is great kindness out there and it’s blossoming around me. This is blitz mentality. Nothing is too big. I’m humbled, inspired, impressed, and encouraged. Then there’s the selfishness of those who hoard, who evict, who crowd and infect, who value economy over life, who take out their boredom, fear, and self-entitled attitude on me, on others. The yin and the yang, the light and the dark, the good and the bad, the mensch and the schmuck (and we need some feminine words for those, don’t we?).

Truth number six – Meals are hit and miss. None are Insta-worthy. What’s on the store shelves, what’s in the flat, how can I make something out of it, why do I care? No longer the cleverly put together and presented plates to linger over. Now it’s a half cup of soup from the containers in the fridge, a cracker, a piece of cheese, a hardboiled egg, some fish fingers, meat balls made from the meat that didn’t go into hamburgers, an indulgent few pieces of the chocolate that needs to last at least a week.