next to normal...

and so we slide towards summer...covid restrictions are lifting week by week...we are seeing family and friends...vaccinated, we hug...lunging towards life as it had been...but we really can't...we are in the new normal...a unique state where we excitedly embrace all that we have missed...but with pause...for those who lost someone to covid, life will never be as it was...for those of us who had covid, there is either a leeriness to the rapid fire reopening...or a sense of invincibility...to a degree, to move on we kind of need to ignore the news...we did have falling numbers of cases...and hospitalizations...this morning I read of a concerning plateau...which paired with sinking vaccinations rates and increases of a more virulent and dangerous delta variant could spell an unsettling fall for the unvaccinated...and they are a formidable number...but people spin the dial on that one...the thought of another pause is too painful...there are hockey playoffs...and tickets to buy for the return of concerts and Broadway...cheer fellow Americans at the Olympics in Japan...a country currently drowning in the virus...there are masks to burn...and school board meetings to scream at...time to get front row seats as deniers eviscerate Fauci...a modern day Roman coliseum headliner...watch out for the cougher in row 2...

Coffee, no sugar...

and so yesterday, I finally made my way back to the office...in the city...after 13 months...now, understand, I do work largely from home...going in one or two days a week at best...but...so there I was...bracing to see this city...my only city...after a long absence...the changes are there...but in honesty they were there before...the changes are, in part, due to the ravages of a society where the gap between the "haves" and "have nots" is stretched beyond the limit...where there has been a mayor who still cannot get beyond singing "Kumbaya" and really do the work...the sometimes ugly and unpopular work that is needed to run this city...there was a sad sigh in seeing it all...the barrage of "closed" and "for rent" signs...the homeless, both breaking your heart and leaving the hair at the back of your neck standing at attention...and so I did my Dorothy skip on the yellow brick road...making my way down the street...avoiding the dog crap...at least I hope it was...dotting the landscape...and opening the door to my favorite coffee shop...which was open and survived this era of Covid...leaving a tear in my eye...the wonderful early morning aroma of fresh brew and warm pastry...and there she was...the manager...cheerful and welcoming as if we had never missed a beat...we talked briefly...I told her it was my first day venturing through the midtown tunnel...and smiled at her...but the mask...could she see the smile lines crinkle in the corner of my eyes?...in the office...placing my hot paper coffee cup in the middle of the desk resembling a Mt. Vesuvius of papers...I sat...and closed my eyes...yes, it is like the seventies out there...without the good music...but it is my fervent prayer we come back again...the hustle...the bustle...the people...the only city...New Yawk...

Under His Eye...

timing is everything in life...just ask Margaret Atwood and her creation The Handmaid's Tale...I admit I am late to the Hulu series...binging through Season Two as I type...but as both a reader, and writer, I was not late to the game when the book was released in the mid-80's...a fictional...some said science fictional look at life in 2005...gee, what could have been her inspiration...the good times of Thatcher and Reagan?...the book, revered, dismissed and sometimes banned left more than a little food for thought...and now, a few days shy of 61, sometimes it is hard to fathom how much things have changed for women...and not...for me...as a girl in the 60's heading off to school...having to wear pants under my dress on cold days, then remove before class started...I look at the credit cards in my wallet...it wasn't until the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that women could get a credit card without the co-signature of a husband or male family member...Mondale takes Geraldine Ferraro on the ticket in 1984...McCain takes Sarah Palin in 2008...and now Kamala Harris...always a bridesmaid in my time...maybe not in the future...back to Handmaid's Tale...the series has chosen to modernize it to reflect our times...interracial couples...gay couples...Atwood was more blunt about what would happen to people of color in her Gilead...but the red cloaks remain...the simmering anger and fear when watching are elicited...in the U.S. today birthrates are declining...reasons range from  economics... choice...environment's possible influence on fertility (something to ponder on Earth Day)...and that, my friends, is one statistic that creates underlying panic in some circles...circles with clout and money...and so I continue to binge and watch Elizabeth Moss and clan...and note painful similarities to changing mores and laws...and wonder...why the hell I chose to watch this at the second year marker of this endless pandemic...but as much as I'd rather watch a repeat of SVU I find I cannot look away...episode after episode...under his eye...

wabbit season...

chocolate bunny rabbits...Cadbury eggs...Peeps...pristine baskets wrapped in a spring palette...the youthful joys of Easter are quite lovely...and as much as Passover will always be my favorite Jewish holiday...you gotta admit...how can chocolate covered matzoh or macaroons compare?...cause after the chocolate rush...they sit in the pit of your stomach like lead...which explains our forefathers wandering in the desert for 40 years...that, and you, might be thinking that Moses never would have turned to Zipporah for directions...but I digress...it really is a season of rebirth, religiously speaking, for many...and our second such season during covid...the pandemic creates a sort of underlying fear that permeates everything...kind of brands us without conscious realization...we miss...no, we crave the rituals...the things that tie us to one another and keep us sane...and grounded...painting, then hiding Easter eggs...the long Passover table meticulously set with the finery of relatives long gone...this year, depending on where you sit in the vaccine or antibody curve...maybe there was a table set at Passover...or one today waiting for relatives to take seats after church...or maybe you are not ready...and so it is small or zoomed...whatever your celebration...we all know deep down we pause and look forward to next spring...wabbit and Moses season...healthy with loved ones...our only complaint - MLB trades...as we reach for a glass to toast the host...Happy Passover and Happy Easter everyone!

525,600 minutes...

"how do you measure? measure a year?"...and here we are...a year later...the words to Jonathan Larson's "Seasons of Love" keep resonating with me...how are we?...whether we admit it out loud...or deep within when we are up at night...and we all have been up at night...we are all a little worse for wear...putting one foot in front of the other...just to go to the other end of your living space for so many weeks...well, that does strange things to your head...as Covid cases mounted...the odds were stacked...we all knew someone who had Covid...maybe it was us...we all knew someone who didn't make it...and now the scramble for the vaccine...a sense of encouragement...but we are weary and don't want to "be good" anymore...because somewhere inside we realize that the longer it takes to resume life as we knew it...the harder it will be to do so...and life will not be as we knew it...it cannot be...and that is a painful truth...tell me there won't be a shiver down your spine that first time you travel...or dine inside, if you haven't...or see a movie...and hopefully, a Broadway show...or sporting event...tell me what your fight or flight instinct will do when someone coughs more than once...this is the collateral damage of a pandemic...there is no reference point for any of us to look back to...this is the point going forward...the page in history books that will always be a part of our psyche...much in the way of September 11th...and I wish we were at the point where we comment on looking back...in as much as there is light at the end of the tunnel...we are still traveling through...thinking about what this year has meant...what lessons we have learned...what we will choose to take forward as we near the end of the tunnel...maybe Jonathan Larson, in his too brief life, had it right..."remember the love"...

The Hunger Games...

ready...set...go...log on to the computer...refresh...try the phone...dial the number...leave it on speaker...is covid gone?...is Springsteen touring?...no, you are trying to get a vaccination appointment...every state has different protocol...or none...so if you live in a state where your neighbor's retriever is in the new group...others...like us weary New Yorkers...are stuck in neutral...the city bitches that "outsiders"...you know, Long Islanders...those from Westchester...are taking their appointments...and there you have it...frustration and anger under the skin of a society locked down for a year...there really is no method to this madness...and as this unfolds we watch states like Tex-ass plan on removing mask mandates...a state where roughly 6 million of a total 29 million Texans have been vaccinated...that's not a herd immunity state...methinks Gov. Abbott took statistics with Betsy DeVos...when the governor of Alabama disagrees with this...you realize how truly screwed up the whole thing is...healthy, younger not yet vaccinated New Yorkers...working and commuting...walking through the leper colonies of Penn, Port Authority and Grand Central...where the mentally ill unmasked population greet them each work day...I hope there is light and vaccine at the end of the tunnel for all...I hope we reach that herd immunity that's been drummed in our ears for months...if you have gotten the vaccine...good for you and I hope it keeps you healthy...stop bragging about it like you got front row seats opening night for Hamilton a few years back...somewhere out there on your social media feed is someone waiting for their turn...out there every day trying to do their thing...praying that the commuter coughing in row 3 has allergies...

(Don't) take the A train...

I happened to google "what happened in history today"...and there it was...in 1941 Duke Ellington first recorded "Take the A Train"...uh, no thank you, Sir Duke...if you've seen the weekend NYC news you will know that a 21-year-old man was arrested for a string of stabbings on the A train line...two people dead...others wounded and traumatized...although ridership is nowhere near what it was before the pandemic hit, subway crimes are up...unless you ask the mayor's office...then you will be met with charts that say no...this is not true...actuarial versus actual...just ask New Yorkers who do ride the trains...and many, I am sure, will profess less of a fear of Covid while riding...and more of a fear of accidentally brushing up against someone and being flung onto the tracks...or sliced like a Thanksgiving turkey...the abundance of mentally unstable individuals living underground is evident...the police have had their hands tied in legislative red tape as to how much they can do...and those who need the subway to get from point A to B to pay the rent...they are caught in a dangerous power play...an MTA teetering on bankruptcy cannot afford this public relations nightmare...the city cannot keep citizens from fleeing unless there is real help for the mentally ill...who need to be separated from the endlessly growing homeless population...so that when outreach groups try setting up housing for the homeless throughout the city they are not met with fear and anger from neighborhood residents...it's all easy to write in a blog...in reality, it takes money, and dedication...new laws, and revocation of laws that cause more harm than good...only then can we all ride that A train up to Harlem with a song in our steps...and not terror in our hearts...