Here's to the Chroniclers

Over at the NYT, Teju Cole says true and clever things about chronicling life in this pandemic, and it reminded me of all the bloggers who update frequently, and are giving credence and structure to readers' experiences via their own daily meditations.  I miss my old blogging peers from the time of the Mutiny and people I met there including Cole himself. I remember him saying something faintly nice about a poem of mine here once upon a time, and how it made the rest of my week/month--something like that. Ha.

I've tried to get the kids to keep journals; Nu got as far as decorating the cover of the new notebook I gave them; At scoffed, but he's quite tweety, so there's that. Anyway, these days, I'm starting internet meanderings with: Ana Begins, Grumpy Ramblings, Harry Times, Not of General Interest, Shu Box, Something Remarkable, and Stirrup Queens.  Updating here daily has helped me remember and process these days--yes I've cried every day for the past week, but apparently I've done so for discrete reasons. (Not really; it's mostly been related to living in the pandemic, but at least I have a list of different things that set me off.)

Here's a link to Cole's essay and some pull quotes where he articulates the anxiety of articulation in the right now.

Teju Cole: We Can’t Comprehend This Much Sorrow: History’s first draft is almost always wrong — but we still have to try and write it. 

"This year has been a blur, but I remember one day clearly: Sunday, March 8. It was the last day I ate at a restaurant, the last day I went to a concert (Red Baraat at the Sinclair in Cambridge, Mass.) and the last day I hugged a friend. It was also the first time I thought that I should begin writing about what was going on.

"That thought was immediately followed by its negation: Why bother? The same incidents, the same references and the same outrages would inevitably be picked over by other writers; for all our social distancing, we’d all be crowding around the same material. I also knew that anything I wrote could soon be — in fact was almost certain to be — contradicted by new developments. But what worried me most was that certain points of emphasis in my writing would later prove to have been misjudged, and that this would somehow reveal that my heart had been in the wrong place all along.

Full-blown Weltschmerzen

I had barely laced up my shoes for a walk-run when Nu texted to say there was a deer in the yard and "they look like they're injured." I think I smiled that the 12-year-old was generously using their own preferred neutral pronoun "they" instead of "it" to refer to the deer. Anyway, I climbed back upstairs, and we looked at Nu's deer through the rumpus room doors. 

The poor thing was badly hurt--way more than I expected. Both back legs were bloody and one leg had no hoof, just bone peeking through. It was surprising how they didn't look like they were in pain--actually they seemed very calm and unafraid, although they left when Nu tried to give them some blueberries. 

We called The Humane Society who said they weren't licensed for wildlife and told us to call the non-emergency police line where no one picked up. Nu and I texted friends down the street to be on the lookout. Nu said as we both started to cry that the deer would probably die from the injury or get euthanized, but there ought to be treats and kindness in the meantime.

The thing that really gets me though was how the deer looked at us--unmistakeable eye-contact through the glass doors from 15-feet away. A bit pleading, like--can you help me? I had to go cry in the shower for a while. We didn't know how to help.

Incidentally, that's exactly how I felt when my cousin shared this video (it has English subtitles) about the plight of the migrant laborers in India yesterday on the cousin groupchat. I kind of went off the deep end so she called to check on me and panicked when she couldn't reach me (because I was in the shower crying yesterday too).

What's the News?

I feel more like Scout than Nu today.

Lots to tell.

But it'll have to wait until tomorrow, because today's been a bit much.

NYC from a Distance

New York looks strange and empty--at least in Big A's picture. He's scheduled to work at New York Presbyterian and stay at the (Leona) Helmsley Medical Tower, which I keep calling "the Cruella DeVille hotel" in my head.

He just finished reading Atticus Lish's Preparation for the Next Life, which I read when it came out (2014) and loved and recommended. I wouldn't say it to him because of the way it ends, but something about two people from vastly different places in the world falling in love in New York resonated with aspects of our own story...

Countdown and Cope

People have been asking me how I am, and I have to say--I'm great!  I dreaded the countdown to Big A's departure, but now I get to countdown to his return from NYC!

I'm booked so solid today, I doubt I'll even have to time to miss him. Work meetings to discuss campus contingencies, a panel presentation on social justice in my colleague's class on pandemics, a hike with L, and book discussion with the 'Food for Thought' people. Then dinner prep and dinner with the kids.

From yesterday's picture, it would seem coping involves midday Margaritas, all the Oreos, and the last twenty pages of The Great Believers I saved so I could be anguished over something unrelated to saying goodbye to Big A.

Goodbye (photo-note)

"not gonna cry, not gonna cry, not gonna cry"

"love you, pups! love you"

Out and About

We were just coming back from our afternoon walk when we ran into R, T, and L--who  took this picture from across the street. I demurred when she brandished her phone, but she growled: "Just stand with your husband, Maya!" Big A and I are still chuckling about that hours later. I love L so much.

Big A has two flights booked for NYC tomorrow so he'll be able to get to his first shift on Friday even if one flight gets canceled. We've made so many contingency plans like this trying to manage all kinds of risk. I have to admit it all still feels pretty unreal. He'll leave first thing tomorrow.