It’s Sunday. But I’m back in bed, oddly repeating everything that happened on Saturday morning. This is the beginning of Groundhog’s Day, coronavirus version. Bill Murray, where are you?
So back to yesterday.
Waking up. It’s Saturday. Sleeping in to 8 AM is finally possible IF I can resist the urge to do something about the wails of our child calling for maman down the hall. That toddler crises is a hoax, one invented to test and try me. It’s the pire of all toddler whale songs. In the Bear Report, Olafur asks Sophie When did you learn to speak whale? after she plops her head underwater to call to the whales to lift them up to shore. Today she says. And that’s kind of like me. When did I learn to speak toddler? Who knows. Probably around the same time I started to get white hair along the front part of my hairline. But I know the whale songs of my child: when she’s hurt, there’s a long pause between her high-pitched shrieks. When she’s sick, it’s a lethargic SOS cry, low and run down. When she’s scared, it’s fast and pierces my heart – and I know I need to drop everything and run. But this morning’s wail was that of a cranky test. The worst toddler whale song of them all. It’s meant to be a coup, an innocent attempt to overtake my one extra hour of quiet morning time in bed all for the sake of better understanding her young, developmental exercises in cause and effect. Luckily Romain is patient. He’s been standing at her door, playing the role of mediator between a three year old and her mind on fire, on this, day five of full home confinement.
Though I have my permission slip, one thing I absolutely don’t want to do is leave the house to go anywhere other than the woods for a run. I constantly think about the grocery store clerks who are having to leave their families to go to work in a very public setting to aid in ensuring that basic needs are met. And I’m sure there’s more than a fair share of connards who have to have their cheese, thus risking infection to themselves, to the store clerks, to their families at home. If you’re thinking that you need to run to Lidl to fill your cart up with nothing but liters of Coca-Cola, please note: we will see you on the nightly news. I will throw my soapy sponge into the kitchen sink and gawk at your face on the television screen from across the room. There will be a few WHAT??s that escape our mouths followed by shame talk. And I will return to this blog and note your actions. Connards seeking cheese. And you with your soda addiction.
If you are reading this and live in a community that is on the verge of a total lock down, it’s time to get prepared if you haven’t already. Denial and mumbling on about your right to assemble is not going to feed you, nor will it help pass the time when there’s a child at your knees looking for a new activity to engage in every fifteen minutes. For my friends in the West, of the three main unalienable rights, LIFE is listed first. We all just want to live through this. So, in a rare exercise of my Aggie roots, hear this: it’s time to sit the fuck down bus driver. Get your house prepped, and then sit the fuck down. Really. It’s going to be awhile.
THE CACHETTE 