The birds don’t know. They’re singing as the sun climbs higher in the sky. Spring is continuing with its plans as various shrubs come out of hiding for Fashion Week, sporting pink and white and red buds.
The news outlets are encouraging us to call our grandparents – if only! – to find out what they used to do in their day, how they filled their free time at home, inside with family and outside, playing with their imaginations. Board games can be dusted off, families can reconnect and we can return to togetherness, the new separate variety.
What do you do if your family doesn’t like board games, won’t sit with you and play Scrabble (asking for a friend :)? Do you force family fun time or let teenagers default to video games and group chats? The prospect of being home together indefinitely looms and I suppose as with most things, you strike a balance, engage and disengage. There is food in the fridge and dry goods to tide us over, though I wasn’t early on amassing TP so we’ve got all of 14 rolls in the cupboard. I remind myself, stores will restock and besides, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s toilet paper supply.
That I even stopped to count tells me I’ve been watching too much news. My husband toggles between CNN and MSNBC, and the numbers of doctors and experts they interview and re-interview is staggering. Yet the news is largely the same: wash your hands the right way (I’ll spare you another set of instructions), stay home, practice social distancing. It will get worse before it gets better. What else can we do as we wait?
Italians are choosing to open their shutters and sing, tap tambourines and wave to one another across piazzas. The Whos down in Whoville had the same idea as they awoke to nothing yet realized they already had everything. It’s morning and those birds are still at it, and a light breeze ushers in their concert through my kitchen window. The sun streaks across the breakfast table as the house sleeps. The TV off dials up the sounds, the refrigerator rattling, the dog sleeping and cats moving through rooms sizing up the day.
The natural world is calling. While we can’t touch our eyes, nose and mouth, we can see and smell and taste the season, and let it touch us. We’ve all got tickets to our very own Broadway show outside ready to fill up our insides. Be well and enjoy the show.
If only I could think and write as you do. Perfect words of encouragement. I am going to make bread.
Thank you for that push.
Hey Judy – How lovely that you made bread! We’ve got to find those things that soothe, whether that be birds or bread. Be well. xo
You are truly magical. If I could duplicate, bottle, and sell your spirit, I’d make a fortune…. Or maybe I would just hoard it all for myself like so much toilet paper?
No doubt I’ll crank out another. How much toilet paper have you got? Asking for that same friend 🙂 xoxo
Susan, I love this! It brings back such a mix of emotions. Just today my sister and I were talking about how this virus is helping us to do things we did in the past, when we didn’t have so many distractions. I recall, when me, Marty, Frederick got the Chicken Pox or Measles (at the same time or close enough). Of coarse we had to stay inside, curtains drawn, and our grandmother brought homemade chicken soup. It was not normal, but so comforting, her act of doing that for us. Also brought us new paper dolls to cut out and enjoy. I love your writing.
Love those vivid memories! Maybe I need to draw MY curtains?! And the new paper dolls. What a treat! xoxo