Walking the Line

by Lauren Mossotti-Kline

I still remember what day it is. Somehow Fridays still resemble normal Fridays. At the end of the day, when I hit send on the last work email and the kids have finished their school work, we ease into a more relaxed, less structured mode. A sense of release. I’m looking forward to starting a puzzle. Watching a movie.

It’s technically spring and a winter warning appears on my phone’s screen. I laugh at the cruel joke of it all. This notice comes my way just moments after texting friends about a hiking spot I’d like to explore with my family in the next day or two. Should I look into renting snowshoes instead?

The kids will be home from school for another month according to the latest news and everyone going into a space where social distancing is a challenge must wear a mask. Stores are creating new products to meet current needs. My sister-in-law found a set of three masks in trendy patterns and soft material. They are now a fashion accessory.

I haven’t been around anyone other than my husband and three children, two dogs and two cats for four weeks. I daydream about trips to the coast. Any coast will do. Give me a beach with soft warm sand, gentle waves and gorgeous sunsets. I do not need to talk to anyone but I would appreciate a change in scenery.

Even a lake up north would be fine. Bring on the sunshine and the open road. I’m not sure anyone would rent to us right now but I’d be willing to try. Heck, I’d be willing to relocate for the next month just to give us all a change. As long as we have access to a Wifi signal we could be anywhere.

I’ve said from the beginning of all this that it’s like we’re living through a science fiction novel. Someone mentioned Stephen King in a clever meme. I think about The Shining from time to time. But we — my little family in our safe home and seemingly unaffected existence — are not living through the scariest part of this story. We are mildly inconvenienced.

Today, while doing research for my book, I read about the Spanish Flu. There was a first wave and a second. We’re told that we learn from our past but history repeats itself. The second wave of the Spanish Flu was even more devastating than the first. It came in the fall, and as temperatures cooled, it continued on for a year and a half. We are only one month into our first wave.

Friends with ties to colleges and universities have shared that they are planning for the possibility of online learning at the beginning of the fall semester. If that’s true, the same will likely be true for my school-aged children. As I casually mentioned this to my oldest son who is in the midst of his teenage social ascent, he announced that he cannot miss out on his summer, that he will completely lose it if he can’t see his friends and that he’s already starting to lose his mind. “I’ve caught myself talking out loud to myself Mom,” he said with more humor than concern but I got his point.

I have everything I need right now. I’m content at home with my family. I use technology to stay connected with my closest friends and my work is moving forward and feels meaningful. I find projects and activities to keep me creatively stimulated. I’m reading. I’m writing.

While I write my husband is my daughter’s lab assistant as she dissects a chicken wing for anatomy class. This wouldn’t have happened in the absence of a pandemic. I’m not giving this virus credit, yet I cannot ignore the notable consequences. We’ve experienced our fair share of frustrations, but there have been beautiful moments mixed in. I wrestle with keeping routine and order, monitoring academic expectations while in the back of my mind wondering if any of this will even matter. If tragedy finds our family, I know I won’t give a second thought to whether my son uploaded his math worksheets.

Instead I would likely wish I had spent more time at play. Enjoying their company, talking about anything that interests them and exploring the world in ways accessible to us in this time of preventative behavior. Having a bonfire and camping in our backyard. Playing board games, hugging my kids every day and telling them stories about my youth and the lessons learned. Asking them if they have ever been in love or what they imagine love to feel like. Cooking meals together, making silly movies of ourselves doing ridiculous things and eating all of our favorite foods.

But instead I’m operating under the guise of a “new normal” and not panicking or making any sudden changes. I feel isolated from the enemy in a fake form of protection. Am I naïve? Am I ignorant? People once close to me have walked into the eye of the storm, committing weeks, maybe months of their lives to help people who are fighting for their lives. I liken them to military medics tending fallen soldiers, helping them heal or in many cases holding their hands, offering comfort as they pass from this world.

If I sit with my thoughts and let them continue to this battlefield, I see tear-stained faces, fatigued bodies and crushed souls. Hope is a distant memory and it will take much convincing and likely years of therapy to help heal the hearts that have been broken by this massacre. It seems selfish that I can just sit here and enjoy watching my daughter learn about tendons and muscles while other daughters are losing their mothers and fathers. I see stories about people who have died but I skim the headlines to protect myself from the empathy that has the power to consume me. I’m reminded of the helplessness I felt when my good friend’s cancer returned last year and she was abruptly taken from us just a month later. I think of my mom and am grateful that she did not have to live through this. The anxiety would have overtaken her every thought. But none of my sad memories come anywhere close to what I know others are feeling.

So I remain here in this odd place. Waiting. But for what I’m not sure. The great unknown lurks in the shadows, watching us, warning us, suggesting that we should be on guard — don’t get too comfortable. With every occasional sneeze I pause, then shrug it off assigning guilt to the dust bunnies that reside in the corners of our home. And I continue to walk the line between fear and content.