Journal of the Plague Year 4-2-2020

No posts for several days. This is not because I am sick with COVID-19, but because the days under isolation are so similar that there is literally nothing to report. We have almost completed Better Call Saul. It’s getting increasingly dark and violent. We streamed several performances of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra—Schubert, Bach, and Schumann. The wonderful pianist Jeremy Denk performed Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor. 

I am reading the Ronan Farrow book about his effort to develop a story about the sexual predations of film producer Harvey Weinstein. The book, Catch and Kill, is exhaustive and suspenseful, but IMHO is not as well-written as some of the gushing reviewers would have it. It might make a better movie along the lines of the film Spotlight, which chronicled the story of the Boston Globe’s investigation into the archdiocese’s effort to cover up its own sex scandal. 

Decluttering has ground to a stop. I feel as if there is all the time in the world—this is going to go on for a while, and I will get to it when I get to it. I try to get in some exercise every day, whether it is a short walk or a stint on the almost functioning exercise bike. My forays into continuing with Hungarian are episodic—I have significant trouble with adverbs and the accusative. Since I will probably never visit Hungary again, it is an intellectual exercise.

Mitzi the Cat now goes out at night—she can sense the feeble Minnesota spring trying to emerge. She doesn’t stay out long. I read somewhere that cats can either get or transmit the virus. Since she spends most of her time underneath the parked car and never interacts with any other beasts (human or feline), I suspect that she is virus-free. But I cannot know for sure, so it’s just one of the many unknowns that are the new-normal. We need to get used to ambiguity.

 

Journal of the Plague Year 3-29-2020

I made it 11 days before skipping a blog post. Writing a post is not hard to do, but the sameness of life under quarantine, or whatever this is, is kind of boring and depressing. It is easier to curl up with another episode of Better Call Saul.

That show is also depressing. The first seasons chronicle the efforts of the hero (first named Jimmy and later Saul), a corner-cutting attorney from a bad law school, to make his brother love him. The brother, also an attorney, is accomplished but seems to have an unreasonable hatred of Jimmy. I am sure I will learn the backstory at some point. It is sad to watch Jimmy turn himself inside out for his brother, who we know is a nasty piece of work. Families! 

To stay connected to my family, I use Skype and Zoom. Joe the graduate student (aka Peter) must use Zoom to conduct his online recitation sections for second-year calculus students. The first class is tomorrow. Today, we were his Zoom test case. He is growing a beard and looks good. It was great to see him on-screen. 

Joe College, aka Will, has been laid off from his two jobs in Seattle. Both jobs involved bars and restaurants, one as an operations manager and one as a bartender. He has applied for unemployment, but he will receive far less than it takes to live in that very expensive town. Bottom line, the three-month Bernie bonus that will supplement state unemployment checks will be very welcome. 

Joe, aka Nicholas, is working as a security guard in a parking ramp (and considered an “essential” employee by the state of Minnesota) while going to school. He believes he has been infected with COVID 19 and does not want to visit. We are hoping to set up a Skype or Zoom meeting with him. I miss having him come by the house as we have ‘t seen him for almost a week. 

I also use the old-fashioned telephone. For example, I don’t usually talk with my brother very much, but since the advent of the virus, we talk more frequently, updating each other about cousins and other more distant relatives. We have sort of split up the family; he is in contact with some and I correspond with others. It works, kind of, but it is a far cry from families with many connections who meet often. My parents did not drag us around to big family gatherings, so we don’t know many relatives beyond the most immediate. It is a sign of advancing age that I wish I knew more of them now. 

I even write to some folks by postcard and letter rather than email (my preferred method these days). They don’t have phones or access to email. I can’t visit them now, so sending a cheesy postcard or a greeting card from an art museum is a way to stay connected and let them know they are not forgotten. 

No recent decluttering to report. In addition to Better Call Saul, we watched The Human Stain, a film based on the novel by Phillip Roth. Starring Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman, the story feels a little dated. It’s about a very light-skinned African American professor who decides he is going to be white. Some say that the story is based on the life of New York Times art critic Anatole Broyard, although Roth always denied this. Reviews of the of the 2003 film were mixed, but I enjoyed the efforts of Kidman and Hopkins in difficult roles--roles that were not suitable for them.

Stay in touch with your loved ones by any means possible. And keep those TV and film recommendation coming.