How to Pass Time

This pandemic has been insatiable. It gnawed at the spring, slowly at first, then picking up speed until it consumed the last portions of the school year, including the usual habits and rituals of transition and completion. It ate my daughter Q’s birthday back in late April, which had to be celebrated via a surprise Zoom party with her friends who each set their virtual backgrounds to a favorite pic of her and them together. It ate the meat of my son M’s 17th birthday and left the bones of adulthood wet in his lap. It ate Mother’s and Father’s Day. It ate my wife’s birthday and then somehow still had room for mine. It unhinged its jaw and swallowed the summer whole — no camps, no travel, no lazy city days with friends — and now it’s licking its lips at the fall.

We have been fortunate all in all. Suddenly online high school wasn’t ideal, but M&Q’s teachers handled the pivot reasonably well until everyone limped over the finish line. My wife and I still have jobs, at least for the moment, work that we can negotiate remotely even as demands on us have intensified. New York was hit extremely hard early on, and we stayed inside as much as possible, covered our faces, did our best to help Flatten the Curve. We haven’t gotten sick. The city is beginning to come out of its crouch, and we feel more comfortable being out in the masks that Q made for us. But when we’re out, we still can’t manage to see the end of this…