Coronavirus...Tempo
Spring at the old apartment
May 4, 2020. Finally stopped raining last night. Sunny and windy today. Cool, but no longer cold. Actually completed my much deferred 16,000 step daily walk before 8:30 this morning. With late winter weather blowing through in March and April, it's been difficult for me to keep my head on straight and my body fit.
I don't mind the stay-at-home order as I'm a writer. The forced quiet solitary environment makes setting a steady writing production tempo fairly easy. I can produce a consistent set of pages almost everyday. Currently, I'm restructuring and revising my first publishable book. The target date for publication is looking like sometime in July at the pace I'm going. But days of looking out of the window to see gray not blue skies was a counter measure that depressed my energy as well as killed off my juices. Hail to the gods! Today is a productive day again! The sun is shining!
Although friends my age delight at having everything, including groceries delivered right to their door, I find life without retail in-store shopping a sad life. The pandemic has transformed going to the grocery store with my chef, the husband, from a mundane 'have to' activity to a special event, like a date (well, almost). We plan the day and time together and make a list of what 'we're going to see'. I dress up (something other than a sweatshirt and yoga pants), freshen my face with a bit of make-up (anything to take the paleness of in-house living away), and grab a mask (a fashion must) as we leave the apartment together as if anticipating a good visit with old friends. Being of Italian heritage, he so yearns to caress the tomatoes, just as he loves to hug people. I slap his fingers. "It's not allowed anymore," I say. He hangs his head.
With restaurants closed, the chef continues to cook and I continue to clean-up. Needless to say we've eaten some very fine food; stayed off the carbs and sipped great wine, even if a bit too much occasionally, just because. But read between the lines and you'll learn that we haven't had a single french fry since March 11. The withdrawal was pretty well under control until today. Our favorite burger place next door to our building just reopened for carryout last week. The aroma of salty, properly greasy and crispy french fries turned our noses getting the better of our good 'staying healthy' intentions. This afternoon at 2:00 PM there was an orgy in our apartment -- not a sex orgy, but a french fry orgy. We savored touch and every moment of the re-connection.
Of course, because of this unexpected and delightfully enjoyable binge, I get no dinner tonight.