Living in Coronavirusworld 241: One day closer

 

1/17

What we need

Our ZOOM meeting with my mother in her assisted care facility is filled with tech issues. My mom's been left with only "speaker view" so she can't understand why people keep disappearing. Explaining is not easy. The transcript would be an entertaining slice of Coronavirusworld life one act.  My niece, a middle school principle in Ohio, says "So now you know what it's like trying. to teach these days."

The Gate has added outdoor heaters, like more and more restaurants every day. But heated tables are in high demand so my friend and I are luck to get an unheated table at the corner. Where the wind whips around. I stick with Jameson's but she goes with a hot toddy. And a shepherd's pie for me  to keep warm. We can make it just about an hour in this weather.  When I go in to pay the bill, owner Paul is happy for our loyalty. Shots are shared.

1/18

Coffee, pastry and Sunday Times at my favorite Venezuelan cafe. But the wind keeps rustling my paper and cooling my coffee so its a short visit. 

As our family gathers for its weekly international ZOOM meeting, we all struggle to come to terms with our current covid reality. Two of us here in New York, teachers, are scheduled for vaccines. My son in Berlin is especially confounded as the country that seemed to have it all under control and was seemingly a model response now seems to be completely at a loss as to what to do as numbers pass New York City and percentages near American levels and a new lockdown in effect.  Teachers have all but given up.

waiting for the vaccine

First day of vaccinations at Wadleigh High School across the street from me. People lined up around the block. Like the voting lines. 

Late afternoon, as the sun goes down, we walk to the Israeli cafe for coffee. There is some anxiety around the lack of ventilation in the outdoor seating area. So we don't stay long. We walk in the dark to Central Park to see if the floating tree in the Harlem Meer is still lighted. The tree is still there. But now dark.

1/19

Martin Luther King, Jr. day

Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Tonight we cancel our Bible Study because the New York City Presbytery is holding a (virtual) Rosa Parks/Martin Luther King, Jr. commemoration service. Music from a Black church in Harlem and a Korean church on Queens, A preacher from Detroit. The sharing of communion, each in our own place.  On this King day, in this year, on the cusp of the exit of a disgraced President and the inauguration of a new one, there is a special resonance to the vision of a Beloved Community. Dr.King's radical vision needs to be reclaimed from the effort to take the hard economic analysis out of his witness. He was ready to take on, to name, the predatory consuming nature of capitalism. Beyond identity politics, the progressive political constituency needs to bring the class issue back into focus in the years ahead.

1/20

Donald Trump's last day in office. We are on the verge of the change. My friend Steve comes up for coffee. We sit in the cafe's patio and review these last 4 years. Wondering how we can begin to overcome the gaps between two countries. There is a growing awareness that significant portions of our religious communities sold their souls in support of a nativist authoritarian politics. Both orthodox Judaism and evangelical Christianity have much to answer for. 

I spend three hours trying to find an appointment for a vaccination, all to no avail.

The President elect hosts a ceremony with 400 lights to commemorate the now more than 400,000 deaths from Covid. Repeat that number...400,000 fellow citizens, fellow Americans. Dead. More than World War II. The lights glow next to the reflecting pool. On into the darkness. 

Living in cornavirsuworld 227: See you in a couple of weeks....

 

12/12

86th Street windowwdtttc           

Moat of the college football games I wan to watch have been cancelled. The season continues to stagger along to its conclusion, in the south they even have fans in the stands. Some teams and many players have just decided to end the seasons.

I make my weekly visit to the farmers market, stopping for fresh baked cookies and a cup of rich Colombian coffee. 

We get together for a ZOOM with my mother in her assisted care facility. The isolation of elderly in this renewed lockdown is very difficult but residents of these facilities are still dying at disproportionate rates. It’s hard explaining to her that we’re all dealing with this, each in our own way. 

I go on a long walk in search of soufganiyot, the traditional Channukah jelly donuts. Which leads me to the iconic Upper West Side Barney Greengrass. They’ve built a large outdoor facility. I ask the owner Gary if he’s prepared for the new crackdown on indoor dining. He gestures around, “I never opened,” he said, “I knew this was going to happen.” And I quickly see it’s true. On my walk, it’s clear that this is the most muted of holiday seasons. A wall mural in Harlem proclaims Stella Artois’ beer’ support of outdoor dining.

Watch Steve McQueen’s first episode in his “Small Axe series. “Mangrove”tells the story of A London restaurant that quickly became a gathering place for the British West Indies and Jamaican community. Set in 1968, it's revelatory to me to see what was going on on London while the “revolution” pored into the streets of American cities. The main focus is the trial of nine parsons of the constantly harassed restaurant arrested for fomenting a riot in a protest against police violence. The struggle of the accused ot maintain solidarity in the face of threaten jail time and the temptations of plea bargains is profoundly moving as a community acts to establish that they belong. When one long suffering friend of the Mangrove owner decides he’s going home, the owner looks around and says, “This is home.”

12/13

Monkey Cup Tree

Warm enough for coffee and he Sunday Times at my favorite Venezuelan coffee shop. Decorated for Christmas.

Stella mural

Since it looks like the last warm day for awhile, I decide to do one last virtual race, the San Francisco Marathon (virtual) 5k making a course along the edges of Central Park.x                                 

My family gathers for its weekly ZOOM meeting. My Berlin son feel very alone as the rest of his family ah gone to Croatia, the schools are closed a week early and everything in Berlin shut down. He is increasingly convinced that no one really knows what they’re doing . That the scene in Sasha Baron Cohen’s new “Borat” move where Borat swings an iron skillet at the wall trying to kill Covid viruses is a pretty accurate image of what we’re doing. As the sun sets, one of us lights Channukah candles and we in Harlem, Brooklyn and Berlin sing the traditional songs, remembering  when we were all together. And wondering when that can be again. All curious as to the when and who of vaccines. 

I stop by my neighborhood pub for one last drink. They are at capacity inside, so I take my drink and chips and salsa outside. It's starting to get cool as I talk to my mom. I go in to pay my bill. The manager smiles and says, “See you in a couple of weeks. Months?" He shrugs his shoulders. She’s his head. Laughs.

My friends Hot Glue & The Gun stream their "Christmas Spectacular"bringing back many of their "guest stars." Somehow in this pandemic they created the perfect vehicle for their performance.  Including a regular coterie of regularly animated inanimate objects. At the end of the day, it was a successfully creative project to create community in this time of separation. Blessings, friends. 

(https://www.facebook.com/hotglueandthegun/videos/20935572747654)

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