Lines. Walking around north Brooklyn we see lots of lines: grocery stores, pharmacies, coffee shops, pizzerias, a store selling French fries on Bedford Avenue (brined in sea salt, twice fried, array of sauces, $7 and up).
“It’s like stories of East Germany or the Soviet Union,” I tell The Kid. “People used to get in the back of lines without knowing what they were lining up for. They figured if other people wanted whatever it was, they’d better grab it.”
“Sure,” she says. “FOMO.”
We pass the Atlantic Yards train depot, near Barclays Center: nine Long Island Railroad cars line up, idle.
Through our bedroom and dining room windows The Kid and I used to watch a steady line of airplanes descending from the southwest, from over New Jersey; from the angle, my guess was they’d soon bank north, land at LaGuardia. (If they turned south they could land at JFK.) Some days, depending on the weather, the stream seemed to last from 6 a.m. into the evening.
We haven’t seen a plane in weeks. We watch birds now — small birds I can’t identify, gulls, an occasional flock of geese, once a lone, fast-flapping duck.
We ourselves line up ourselves less frequently. I haven’t visited any kind of business for almost a month except my laundromat (I’ve always been the only customer), my market (I visit early; never a line of more than two customers), one stop at a bagel store (no other customers).
My market is almost fully restocked: toilet paper, flour, yeast, beef, pork. While looking for asparagus (none, for the second week in a row; but they have artichokes) I overhear a delivery man tell a manager, “We’ve got plenty of almost everything.” Nothing’s on sale, though. My grocery bill seems absurd until I remember that I eat no meals out, am feeding either two or three people (depending if The Kid’s with me) three meals a day. I’m sure I spend less on food than I did Before CoronaWorld.
Two other businesses across the street on Waverly reopen: the bodega, one of the two dry cleaners. I’m happy about the latter; I’ve got a few sweater and shirt stains to address. That said, no one I see would care a fig about a lapel splotch. The Girlfriend did insist on buzzing my hair after eight weeks (“You look terrible”). Her elder child chopped hers a few weeks back.
One evening I pass two women on a brownstone stoop. One, straight rib-cage-length brunette hair apparently fresh from a shower, says, “I am literally wearing a middle-part wet bun every day of my life.” Her vocal fry seems well earned.
Lines. The Girlfriend’s bank offers mortgage payment pauses to its customers; she signs up, forgets to alert her credit union to postpone her automatic payment. She wakes Friday with a jolt, checks the account balance (too low), waits until West Coast banking hours, calls the credit union. She waits, gets someone at a call center, tries to leave a message for what she thinks is the right person.
No one calls back. Over the weekend she transfers enough money to cover the payment. “But I don’t want to pay it,” she says. “I’m in the middle of selling my house; It’ll just go into the big mortgage hole. I’d rather use that money for so many other things.”
On a chilly late Saturday afternoon The Kid and I line up for cupcakes at a well-regarded bakery on Vanderbilt. It’s my first time here: a spontaneous treat for her, a serious cupcake fan. My reason to get her on a walk was to buy bagels, but despite signs saying (online, on the door) the store will be open until 6 p.m., doors are locked. Yet another reminder of my years in Indonesia, where posted hours often proved aspirational. We take a U-turn to the bakery.
“Really, Daddy?”
“Sometimes I can be nice.”
Food & Wine once dubbed these the nation’s best cupcakes. (I, obviously a terrible parent, had no idea the place existed.) The line isn’t long, but the store is small; only two customers at a time. We wrap around the corner onto St. Marks Avenue. A boy ahead of us rides his scooter up and down the block; a woman sits on a stoop talks loudly, I think to herself. (I see neither phone nor ear cord — not dispositive in the Bluetooth age.) Either bakery service is slow or customers have complicated orders; we stand for a while. The wind has bite. Cherry blossoms begin to fall on us.
“Cherry blossoms,” I say, turning to look for the trees.
“Dad. That’s snow.”
The Kid’s right. The wind rips just a few flakes from the swift-moving clouds — still odd for the second week of May.
We buy four: golden vanilla, golden chocolate, Brooklyn blackout, Southern red velvet. Total: $15. (I look at the whiteboard prices to ensure this can be true.)
“Why four?” asks The Kid.
“You get one tonight, one tomorrow.”
“Can I have one now?”
“Yes. But that means no dessert after dinner.”
“Okay!”
(We can count on one hand the times The Kid has willingly postponed a pleasure.)
“Best in the nation” turns out to be hyperbole; the cupcakes are good, but I’ve had better. Plus I could make a batch of chocolate chip cookies or a chocolate cake for less than $15. But The Kid gets few CoronaWorld treats.
Monday. The Girlfriend waits in a phone line for three-and-a-half hours to reach her credit union. The hold music is maddening, but if the volume’s too low she’ll miss it when a human picks up. She finally reaches a call center operator, who connects her to a credit union employee who is remarkably friendly, says he’ll cancel the payment. Her relief is palpable.
I drag The Kid out for another late afternoon walk. We mask up, ride the elevator down, start to walk toward Fort Greene Park.
“I feel sick.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“What are your symptoms? Headache? Sore throat? Fever?”
“Not like that. My body’s okay. I just have no energy. I don’t want to do anything. I don’t care about anything.”
“You mean your soul is sick.”
“I don’t know. I wake up in the morning and think, ‘I want to watch that show on Netflix!’ Then I watch, and it feels like nothing. Like nothing matters.”
“Yeah. That’s ennui.”
“What’s ennui?”
“Exactly what you just described. A feeling that nothing in your life can satisfy you. Nothing can bring excitement, or joy.”
“I have ennui.”
“I don’t mean this as any kind of consolation, but I think you’ve just described everyone I know in CoronaWorld. Grandma. Your aunt. The Girlfriend. Me. We’ve all described pretty much that exact feeling.”
“It sucks.”
“Yes.”
We walk into the park. The air has chill but the sun is out, the wind mild.
“I like that tree.”
“Which one?”
“The one with the three twisting limbs.”
“Can I climb it?”
“Of course.”
“Of course.”
I keep walking. After a few minutes, The Kid runs to catch up with me.
“Daddy, let’s stop. I need to rest.”
“I need to get home to fix dinner.”
“Daddy. I’m really tired.”
“You need to be in better shape.”
“You need to be in better shape.”
“No, Dad. Feel my heartbeat. Ever since I got sick a few weeks ago, I can’t do anything without my heart going a thousand miles an hour.”
“Wow. That’s fast. Maybe we should start doing the ‘Couch-To-5K’ routine again. I’m back up to Week 5, but I’ll go back to Week 1 with you.”
“Dad. I don’t want to do Couch-To-5K. Would you tell an asthmatic to just buck up and keep exercising?”
“Absolutely. It takes pain to gain, Rabbit.”
“You’re a terrible person.”
“Probably.”
Her pulse returns to normal. We walk home, past another bagel store; it’s closed, despite a sign saying it should be open for another 25 minutes.
“CoronaWorld hours,” I say.
(New York state numbers on Monday: 337,055 diagnosed with Covid-19, up 0.5 percent; 162 dead, to a total of 21,640, up 0.8 percent. Overall U.S. deaths: 840, to a total of 74,735, up 1.1 percent.)
No comments:
Post a Comment