Snow Days (Week Forty)

12/19/2020

Snow Days (Week Forty)

I had forgotten how snow can serve as a kind of filter through which you can see everyday objects with new appreciation. Such as this doormat.

Or the steps to our front door.

I had planned on taking pictures at the park, but it was colder than I realized. As soon as I removed the phone from my pocket, the charge went from 90 percent to 'less than 10 percent.' I had images of a cartoon thermometer plummeting.

Back home, I thawed out in the bright light.

The cats were discussing politics and nobody was happy. I was looking forward to the vaccine but had mixed feelings about getting back to 'normal.' Was normal worth returning to? I wish that instead of people saying, 'soon we'll be back to normal,' they would say, 'soon we'll be entering a period of intense, collective self-assessment to ascertain the many (many -- really, an uncountable number of) failures that brought us to this point and the measures we can take now to make sure it doesn't happen again, and by 'it' we're talking not only about the virus but pretty much the trajectory of society over the course of at least two hundred years.'

In retrospect, my pre-pandemic life seemed kind of manic: constantly riding the subway up and down the west side of Manhattan, taking flights and trains to wherever else, sitting in large, underground chambers with hundreds of other people, nobody wearing a mask, ever. Rushing here and there. Getting things done, making plans to get more things done. And not just in a work context, either! Was that life worth preserving? Maybe some of it. I felt paralyzed as I considered the idea of walking through an airline terminal and getting on a plane. I knew I would have to work up to it.

At the same time, there are aspects of being in lockdown -- in some ways, a very long snow day -- that I've learned to appreciate and don't necessarily want to give up. Maybe it was time for a 'new normal.'

When Clio looks back on the pandemic, she's going to tell people, 'I spent most of it in the plant.'

Posted at 11:26 AM in Expression, Science Projects | Permalink

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Music: Death Culture at Sea and Saturnine

Listen or download songs and records from my indie-rock past with Saturnine here and Death Culture at Sea here.

Music Video: Remembrance of Things Past

Watch the rock opera Remembrance of Things Past written and performed by Saturnine and Frances Gibson, starring Bennett Madison and Sheila McClear.

Video: The Chaos Detective

The Chaos Detective is a series about a man searching for 'identity' as he completes assignments from a mysterious organization. Watch the first episode (five parts) on YouTube.

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Expression//Reaction//ScienceProjects

12/19/2020