My pen has been quarantined for days, months, buried under the chaos of normal life. A normalcy that I now mourn and only one word comes to mind: grief…it doesn’t change you, it reveals you. I grieve for a mundane day, an ordinary life only interrupted by the cacophony of honks, screeching tires, loud neighbors, and toddler tantrums. I grieve for morning coffee, seven am workouts, cherry blossoms, brunch on a Sunday… This is quarantine.
Empty schools..parents become teachers again, relegated to their original role of nurturers, rebuilding bonds with little creatures with whom they have been disconnected for too long. A 5-year-old smiling at his mom, loving all the attention he’s been getting lately. The love of his life has never been so present, and the bond with his father has never been stronger. Fifteen thousand miles away, in a small village, there is a 10-year-old girl who has never been to school, her mother’s bedroom is her classroom, she drinks from the knowledge cradled in her mother’s arms, and eats love from her father’s eyes, the modern world has not contaminated her life. This is quarantine.
Grocery store shelves are empty, and our most basic needs are threatened. Toilet paper, eggs, sanitizers, and a loaf of bread, are luxuries. Stand still! This is the story of humanity, the homeless veteran down the street with a sign that reads “ I am hungry, please help me” has always lived in a world with empty shelves, he doesn’t remember the taste of the last piece of bread he had 5 months ago. He always remembers to stay 6 feet away, when he approaches you to get the last dollar you scratched from the bottom of your wallet, your good deed of the day to sanitize that part of your soul you rarely reveal. Your fingers briefly touch his palm while you’re handing him his lunch money, you can’t wait to get home to wash your hands and erase all trace of this encounter. This is quarantine.
Empty streets, fearful stares. Strangers are wearing gloves and masks like smooth criminals. Don’t touch me, don’t come close, let me pull this mask closer now that I am wearing it outside. I am living a double life and have been wearing this mask for so long, I have so many secrets I don’t want you to know. I wear this mask every day, but it’s invisible, so you never notice, you thought the twinkle in my eyes was magic, if only you knew how many dreams are buried there. You thought my smile was charming, if only you knew the terror behind it. There is a man at the cancer institute in South Dakota who is immunocompromised, he has been wearing a mask since 2017, and he can’t hug his son without wearing gloves. He has not been able to eat at his favorite restaurant for six hundred and forty-five days, and he has lost his sense of touch and smell. This is quarantine.
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Stay-at-home orders…trapped in the house you worked so hard for but could never make a home. Three thousand five hundred square feet, surrounded by luxuries, a semi-full fridge, kids running around, pets lounging around, the fifty-five-year-old man you married at age twenty-five is snoring on the couch, you are seven months pregnant, you haven’t shaved in thirty-five days, you want to scream. You want nothing more but to escape this mansion that could very much now be your grave. ‘They can’t keep me here you say, I am free, I am an American’, you don’t know that all along you have been a prisoner of society, even when the door was wide open. Bobby lives in a six-by-eight-foot cell at the Department of Corrections in Tennessee, imprisoned for a crime he did not commit. He was born high on meth to a drug addicted teenager, his original sin was to be raised poor in a society that did not value his kind. Every day, at three forty-five PM, he puts his head between the prison bars and smiles at the officer with the pink lipstick, she smiles back at him and for a brief moment, he tastes the sweetness of freedom. This is quarantine.
Long beards, unkempt hair, nails of a cement worker, eyelashes returned to their natural size. The caveman has finally met the cavewoman after two thousand and twenty years on earth. When was the last time you stood naked in front of your mirror, stripped of all the artifacts Vogue convinced you that you needed? When was the last time you allowed yourself to be seen naked under the coat of deceit that you wear daily? The pretty little lies that you color your face with right before the world says “cheese”, you accessorize your face with the perfect smile, ready to perform act one hundred and twelve. Unwaxed bikinis, bushy eyebrows. This is quarantine.
Sense of touch, the comfort of a hug, a sweet embrace. I watched a doctor cry because he couldn’t hug his toddler, a wife say goodbye to her husband on video as he was taking his last breath, without a touch, no last words were exchanged. This is how it must feel to be an alien. A mother’s last image of her dying daughter, forever imprinted on the screen of her phone, she blew a thousand kisses to the air, hoping one would magically break into the glass of her phone and reach her child on her deathbed. Bodies piling up in bags, old and young, there is no mercy to man, the virus doesn’t discriminate. This is quarantine….
Grieve, because the rose came from the thorn and the fire polishes the diamond. Anything you lose comes around in another form. This is quarantine!
