March 20, 2020 (1 week into self-isolation)
Today is a beautiful, crisp and sunny day. My husband and I decide to go for a stroll on the beach, to breathe in some coronavirus-free air. An hour’s drive is worth it. It is wonderful. The white foamy crests on the waves, as they fold themselves over like shy bearded giants, repeat themselves over and over again. It’s not like you miss anything if you look away. They perform for free, all day long. The fresh ocean air fills our lungs. We walk, hand in hand, flaunting our noses to the 6 feet distance rule. Aren’t we one and the same body after all these years?
I hold my puffy, sleepless face in the wind, squinting to protect my eyes from so much sunlight. Are we really living a nightmare? Or did I just dream it? Why are the clouds and the dunes, the sand and the seagulls so clueless? Don’t they know what’s happening? Where is the panic, the stress, the heart palpitations?
As I follow a trail of child foot prints vanishing in the distance, the moist sand under my feet sparkles with millions of glittering mica particles, like a universe filled with stars. It is mesmerizing. Just like the pictures I saw of the Corona virus floating in the air after a sneeze. Floating in the air, everywhere, invading our lungs and killing us one by one.
‘Stop it right now!’ a voice tells me. ‘Stop with this OCD nonsense. Enjoy the beach!’
I take a deep ocean filled breath and stoop to pick up a beautiful and undamaged surf clam shell. I immediately drop it. How many kids touched this today? Yesterday? How many coronaviruses did they deposit on this shell?
‘Why did you drop that beautiful shell?’ asks my husband. He is not stupid, very much acquainted with my OCD nature. To my horror, he picks up the shell without gloves, shoves it deep in my pocket and dares me to retrieve it with a piercing look. We walk on.
The sky is so blue, it hurts my eyes. I watch the condensation trail of a barely visible plane, as it is expanding across the sky. So magical. Like a giant drawing a perfectly straight white line across the sky. How many passengers on that invisible airplane are carrying the virus? How many are they going to infect once they land? And what about those cute fluffy clouds in the blue sky? Aren’t they full of coronavirus droplets?
‘Stop it, already!’ the voice says. ‘Why the hell did you come to the beach?’ A family is blocking the entrance to the boardwalk leading back to the car. The youngest one has the sniffles. I stop in my tracks, pretending to take pictures of the ocean. I wait. And wait. Finally they pack up their belongings and walk off. I pull the shell out of my pocket, drop it in the sand and hurry back to the car.
March 21, 2020
Karein, my daughter, is working today. She left early, as usual. When I wake up, I open all the windows in her room, drag myself around the house while I drink a cup of tea and wish I had gotten a few more hours of blissful sleep instead of waking up to this nightmare. Life is routine as usual. But it is not. What if Karein comes home with the virus instead of her usual shopping bags? Empty handed but with the killer hidden inside her, until it is time to strike?
Aniko, my other daughter, calls. She has pressure in her chest. We speak for a long time, me trying to give her unfounded reassurance, her, venting her worries. She has scheduled a test at a drive-by but won’t know the results for days. Hans, my husband, left to go to Whole Foods. They have special hours for seniors. Karein being at work, Hans at the store and me sitting here writing, what exactly are we doing? This is not called isolation, it’s called playing Russian roulette.
I am reading about ‘wet markets’, a term that was not part of my vocabulary until now. It is hard not to place the blame at the foot of this mostly Asian practice of eating, selling and trading live, wild, and sometimes endangered animals. Is this new tragedy the animal kingdom taking revenge on us? A tit for that? You kill us, torture us, steal our habitat, cause many of our species to go extinct? Well, here is what we can do to YOU. If you want to get rid of us, you better be prepared to pay the price.
Simplistic, you say? Maybe. But according the WHO ‘Over the last few years, almost all the major diseases that have threatened to trigger major global health crisis and pandemics — be it avian influenza, Ebola, swine flu or the recent novel strain of coronavirus — have more or less originated from animals.’
On the other hand, there have been pandemics in history that have nothing to do with animals taking revenge. The plague of the 14th century wiped out 30% of Europe, at a time when animals still had the luxury of being safe from humans.
March 23, 2020
I read a news headline today that says: ‘Young people fill hospital beds, too, data shows’. Shamefully, I suppress a feeling of Schadenfreude. Covid-19 is not as susceptible to another common disease called ‘ageism’. Are the elderly really more dispensable than younger generations? Who says? Who decides? Is an older life worth less than a younger life? Shouldn’t the vulnerable be given priority? Who decided that a Jewish life was worth less than an Arian life?
Spring is making a hesitant entrance, but will probably be rebuked by a cold front coming down from Canada. The birds don’t know this. They like the warm sun, the stillness of the air, the sweet smell of the budding forsythias. The bare leafless trees, the squirrels darting about, their tails jerking this way and that. The wild turkeys make their first appearance of the season in our yard. They are the chicks that we fed throughout last year’s summer, turned into large, muscular adults, their bright red wattles adorning their bluish heads. Do wild turkeys triage old members of the flock in times of crises? Or is it just Italian turkeys?
Until now, my blinders conveniently shielded me from reality. Now, I am like a horse suddenly spooked by all that was out there, all along. I can no longer hide from my own mortality, from our risky investments, from the precariousness of being old. The bluish veins on my hands remind me that the coronavirus mortality rate is second to highest in my age range.
Other, less delusional creatures don’t have the luxury of sporting blinders. The deer, skin over bones after the harsh winter, knows in his heart that life is not to be taken for granted. The blue jay’s loud, ear piercing call tells other creatures that a hawk is about to select one of them for dinner. They cannot self-isolate. They need to forage to survive. They live with the risk of death every moment of their lives.
November 1918
This is a page taken from my grandmother’s diary, who lived in Budapest
during the
First World War and who contracted and survived the Spanish Flu
The events of public life are unfortunately becoming mean and ugly. Why did they have to murder [Prime Minister ] István Tisza? He bore less responsibility for the war than the majority of the politicians. That he was a narrow-minded conservative, feared for the Hungary of the gentry – for his Hungary – from the proletarian revolution? They have only besmirched the revolution with it, and convinced millions that we have every reason to fear the power of the people, democracy!
But I can no longer take part in public life. I've caught the Spanish flu!
It was my fault. I didn't think I could get it just because people said you could. I visited Etelka, Ata's godmother *, who was infected and seriously so. I am as fit as a fiddle and feel really good, and I thought if I sat a metre away from her bed, I couldn't catch it – sheer superstition! I've since heard that Etelka, the poor dear, died a week later.
I got over my own bout relatively quickly, although I was bedridden for three weeks and felt quite poorly, and then, as I was getting better, I was bored to tears. No visitors were allowed in, Boriska wore a mask with a gauze dressing covering her nose and mouth while she did her duties around me, like a nurse. And there was a point when I was really afraid. Yes, I was afraid of death, and I was dreadfully ashamed of myself. Yet it was no wonder: the papers daily brought news of how many fatal victims this modern plague was claiming. Many thousands died, and for those who do not take to their bed to see it out it often has serious consequences. So I didn't dare get up even when I no longer had a fever. (* Ata was her daughter and my mother).
March 25, 2020
‘On your left!’ yells a voice behind me, almost giving me a heart attack. A dirt biker with a bright red shirt and helmet zooms by, as I walk in the local forest. This is the place where I usually go to be alone, soaking up the sound of crickets and tree frogs. There is a beautiful pond, just the right size to go around on a peaceful afternoon. Red bellied turtles bask in the sun, their shiny little bodies visible on the logs.
Today is not a solitary walk. Cars are piled up along the entrance. I squeeze in between a large land rover and a pickup truck and lock the car. A few minutes later I meet a jogger. She stops in her tracks at a distance that we used to call normal and asks me how to get back to the ‘Punkatasset’ entrance. I unobtrusively inch my way backward, while giving her directions. She continues on her way to meet other humans and I breathe a sigh of relief.
A man is standing still on the side of the path. He follows me with his eyes as I pass him. Why is he standing still? You don’t stand still in a forest, you walk or run. It’s suspicious. Then, I see a boy step out of the bushes, zipping up his fly. They both walk away together. A man is jogging toward me and I brace myself, taking a deep breath, but he stops, picks up a pooh bag and jogs back.
This is ridiculous. This lock-down rule is not working. Instead of infecting the workplace, it is the outdoors that is being contaminated. Couldn’t this have waited till we were ready to colonize Mars? leave comment here
