Letters from Quarantine, Vol. 1

It’s a Quarantine World, and Everything Is Weird Now.

Day 43. Why did the chicken cross the road? Maybe he saw another chicken and wondered if he had Coronavirus.

Where do I even begin?

I’m not sure when you’ll read this. Maybe in a month or two. Maybe a year. Maybe you won’t read it for a decade, or maybe until you sit your grandkids down someday to tell them about the Great Quarantine of 2020.

Just thought you’d like to remember what this was all really like.

In a word… weird.

It’s all weird. It’s weird how weird everything is. It’s weird how normal it’s all starting to feel.

Everyone keeps talking about a “new normal.” Some moments feel normal. Then in other moments of realism, you remember that literally everything is different now.

I’m scared.

Pretty much all day, at all times.

I’m scared for my family. I’m scared for my friends. I’m scared to go to the grocery store. I’m scared to leave my house. Scared of the neighbor I pass on the street. Scared of the kids that run by playing.

I’m scared to go into my own kitchen. Scared to touch the mustard bottle or turn the faucet on.

It’s not that I really think I’m going to die if I touch the mustard. It’s just… I’ve never even stopped to think before touching a mustard bottle before.

Now every little thing I do is a decision. A potential life-or-death decision.

It’s like walking on glass all day every day, every moment of the day, every thought of the day… forever.

I wash my hands constantly now.

20 seconds. Always 20 seconds. Count it out in your head. Sing happy birthday. Look at a clock. Scrub your thumbs and between your knuckles. Crank the water, as hot as you can stand it.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

New life motto. Everything is hand washing now.

Everything is a carefully prepared algorithm. I have 17 carefully thought out steps for anything I do, and I do them all in rhythm now.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Today begins Week 7 in quarantine.

It’s crazy how long that is, even crazier that it doesn’t feel long at all when I ponder how many weeks are still to come.

I haven’t come into physical contact with another human being since March 8.

It is April 21.

I feel for the families with loads of kids running around the home, I really do. But at least they have each other.

It’s so lonely just being… alone.

I haven’t been more than one foot inside of another building since seven weeks ago today.

It wasn’t exactly a normal day.

I left home to mentor a fourth grade student at the school four blocks away. I usually walk, but I drove that day because I hadn’t been feeling well for weeks already with the stress of everything. You never know if you can make it four blocks without needing a stop.

I wonder if I’ll ever see him again.

I drove to the grocery store afterward. Not really sure why. I never go to the grocery story in the middle of the day. Prescient, I guess. My brain told me to stock up, just in case. I bought extra frozen and canned goods.

I noticed a few items at Aldi with special “LIMIT FOUR ONLY” signs.

Lysol wipes. Hand soap. Paper towels. Water bottles.

I never buy any of that stuff.

But I’d been thinking about Coronavirus for weeks already, and something in my brain clicked. If there’s a special limit on these items, it must be because they’re important.

I bought four of each. Thank God.

Six weeks later, I carefully ration them. There hasn’t been toilet paper in stores for weeks. Occasionally there’s a limited supply of some off-brand cleaner. Limit one.

I want to disinfect everything, always. But I can’t. Only 75 Lysol wipes per container.

I allow myself one Lysol wipe per day. A careful balancing act. Everything must be disinfected, but it has to stay that way in June and October too somehow.

The other day I found three new containers of Lysol wipes under the sink, left there from the homeowners I’m renting from. It felt like finding 10 bars of gold. I ate and slept a little better the next few days. Just a little less stressed knowing I had bought a few more weeks.

I never could have imagined driving home that day was the last time I’d use my car in 40 days.

Saturday. That was the first time I drove my car in 40 days.

The first time I left my neighborhood in 40 days.

My friends from church are pregnant with their first, due in a month. Saturday was supposed to be her baby shower, but no one in their right mind would host a baby shower right now.

So we had a drive-by baby shower.

That is a real sentence, that somehow makes complete, rational sense.

A drive-by baby shower.

Friends and family were invited to drive by the cul de sac and honk their horns or cheer. Get out and talk, if you like. If you dare.

Took me an hour to get ready to leave the house. A new process.

Which clothes would I wear? What would I do with them when I got back? Where are my gloves? Where’s my face mask? Take the gloves off when you get in the car, before touching anything. Inside the car is safe. Keep it that way.

Your hand sanitizer! You forgot your hand sanitizer. Turn the car back around and get your hand sanitizer.

Do you need to go to the bathroom?

No.

Might you need to use a bathroom in the next hour?

Maybe.

Better go now. Just in case.

My friends live two miles away.

We stood on the lawn and talked, face masks on, six feet apart.

It was windy. You notice the wind now because it matters who’s downwind.

We tried to take pictures a few times, but they’re impossible. Everyone’s six feet apart. Some way in the front or far behind. People are wearing masks.

Smile!

No need. Can’t see it anyway.

Click.

There’s a little girl running around happily in the wind. She doesn’t know. Can’t possibly.

She keeps trying to run toward her new friends, but she can’t. Anyone she comes close to runs away from her, safely out into the street.

The street is safe because she’s always been told to stay out of the street. No one’s ever told her to stay away from her aunt and uncle.

She has to go potty. Mom takes her across the street and she squats to pee in the boulevard. No one bats an eye. Not like you can go inside anywhere. This is the new normal.

Eventually I leave.

That was the most I’ve been around real, live people in seven weeks.

I zoom now, just about every day.

Did I even know what Zoom was two months ago?

Honestly, who remembers anything about two months ago? Might as well have been two decades.

I go outside for a walk now, every day.

The grass is greener than I remember. The neighborhood streets have become so familiar. I know the warts on the nearby trees. The dogs don’t bark as loud now; they recognize me. Why is that one lawn so lumpy? I wish they’d mow it.

Every day, rain or shine. Fresh air. Daily rhythms.

I notice every other person now.

Every. Single. Person.

I see them on the street. See them walking their dog. See them sitting on their porch, lost in thoughts.

I see them and I avoid them.

Who’s that guy walking toward me? Should I veer off the sidewalk and give him space? Does six feet mean six feet when we’re out in the wind? What if I just close my mouth and hold my breath until I pass? Should I walk into the street? Cross the road to the other side?

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Maybe he saw another chicken and wondered if he had Coronavirus.

Every person I walk by is a threat now. Like they might have some sort of deadly weapon hidden on their body.

They might. It’s just not a physical weapon. Might not even know they have it.

Better to cross the street, just to be safe. Even if it doesn’t bother you to walk by, it might bother them.

Cross the street to get away from that person. Show some respect. It’s the least you can do. Just make sure you make eye contact too. Wave. Acknowledge their humanity.

They’re in this too. They know. You know.

People are scary now, but also not.

It’s so good to see people. Not just zoom-people. Real people.

People seem more like people now, not just obstacles.

The other day when that dude cut me off on the road, I didn’t shout angrily or honk my horn. I wondered if someone in that car might be stressed or distracted. Maybe they were rushing groceries home to disinfect them. Maybe they needed to use the bathroom. Any number of good reasons.

No need to honk. There’s a person in that car, and who knows what they’re dealing with today? They don’t need my honk.

People seem more like people now.

You make eye contact, always.

You smile. They smile back. You can’t see it, but you know.

You appreciate seeing another human being now, whoever they are. Just because they’re a human and they’re worth noticing.

Kindness is winning.

So much is so weird that nothing feels weird anymore.

On Sunday, you woke up excited and nervous, thinking all day about sports. That night, the world live tweeted sports again in real time like it was the Super Bowl.

It wasn’t the Super Bowl. It was the beginning of a 10-hour documentary about sports from three decades ago.

That’s as close as we get to “live” “sports” these days.

The days are longer now.

Every hour drags on. Hours are like days, and days are like weeks.

What day is it today? Who even cares?

The days are shorter now.

You sleep an extra few hours every night. “Sleep.” You lie in bed for hours, thinking about everything. Eventually you fall asleep, deep into the morning.

Hours of each day disappear to restlessness and lost thoughts.

We have all the time in the world but are unable to get anything done. Who can focus on anything? Not me.

I cry pretty much every day.

I talk to old friends, like actually really talk to them. I’m learning things we’ve never talked about before.

I talk openly about the odds of dying now, both for myself and for my loved ones. Like, it’s just a normal daily conversation.

I do the math. The math on death.

People always told me I’d be a good actuary.

I feel like I’m the most cautious of any person I know. I also feel like it’s the appropriate amount of caution.

It’s an impossibly difficult equation. An equation I try to lovingly share with friends and family every day.

A new math. I’m a math major again.

People are good.

I’m learning to believe in people again.

People are coming together, even when we’re apart. Learning to trust each other, even when we should trust the least.

Kindness is winning.

Kindness > Coronavirus

New math. Good math.

Every day is something new. Every hour another statistic. Every news blurb could be tragic.

But sometimes it is good.

The curve is starting to flatten.

People are still dying, lots of dying. Just not as many as there might have been.

Less dead > more dead.

There is no null option anymore, not until vaccine.

New math.

We’re fighting this war together. It will end, sometime.

We are losing the battle but winning the war.

We’ll do this together. Right after we wash our hands.

Lather, rinse, repeat. ■

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