Pandemic diary
April 16, 2021 Delivery
The postman didn’t see my tears. He disappeared before I opened the door. Deliveries constitute the unexpected in endless humdrum days. A new catalog, a birthday card, a wine delivery. A box with three red labels, Cremated Remains, arrived today. Phyllis’ ninety-nine years reduced to an 8.5 x 6.5 x 4.5-inch box of ground bones. I sunk into my wingback chair and stared at the box on my coffee table. She’d trusted me with her hopeful and hellish moments over the past fifty years and deserved a eulogy.
College beauty queen and part-time model, she never lost her flair for florescent pinks and frosty tangerines, for frilly blouses and form-fitting slacks. When shopping, she caressed the fabrics and cooed, “Feel this,” and “This would bring out the blue in your eyes, Mary.” Once, she played me a recording of her radio show tryout from the early 40’s. “I’m gonna love you, like no one loves you. . .” The producer’s improper proposition scared her, and she abandoned her smoky contralto dreams of singing with a big band. One the eve of WWII, she married Bill, a Clark Gable-type. Post-war, she inherited her father’s hatchery and settled into hatching and selling chickens and raising three children. She quit singing altogether and gave me her piano because Bill acted jealous and petulant about her love of music, like she was the unfaithful one. Her dashed dreams delivered my good fortune—I married her beloved son who serenades me every day.
April 17, 2021 Children of Covid
I counted eight babies at Barrone’s Café this morning. Above her mask, one beaming woman gazed at the bundle in her arms, a newborn ignorant of disease and death. The mother’s milky scent, soft breast, and warm breath soothed and lulled the babe to sleep while I ate my scone.
What fears did that mother face when she got the news “Pregnant Positive?” How many times did she cringe when someone coughed in the grocery line? How fast did her heart beat when contractions started and her water bag broke? I read this morning that with rising cases and deaths, births plunged in the same period. Isolation and uncertainty didn’t breed passion for parenting.
Published in Passager Journal”s Pandemic Diaries April 2021