...And then the Pandemic Entered Our Home

Work was finishing up; meetings in San Pedro and the Boy's birthday party on Saturday. The blips in memory take us to Friday night, after putting the kids to bed. 

I got the piñata from the car, grabbed a knife, and carved an opening in the top. And the middle section, it turned out. The sweats were stronger than usual, and hunching my back to stuff handful after handful into the piñata got my joints cranky. Then achy.

Then my skin crawled. My brow moistened. Heat came to my neck like an Elizabethan collar as a shiver rattled bones.

All signs point to Nostril-Swabbing Time. Two lines showed in our home test. Lousy with virus.

Corrie planned to go ahead with the party the next day and I would come at first and set up, and then head home for quarantine. Six AM Saturday morning Corrie realized she felt worse than I did. Party canceled, bummer.

The days blend together, just like the first few weeks back in March and April (and May) 2020. The planned writeup of Legoland and Lizzie and Thomas's wedding wither in folds of grey-matter. Nights of bed-soaking sweats and teeth-chattering shivers commence.

Everyone's at home. The elevator breaks down, so every menial task anywhere becomes adventurous.

Nostril swabs, swabs, swabs all around! Some positive, some negative. What does it all mean? When can we go out? We HAVE to go out, so...?

Days trudge on. The cough lingers. For what it's worth, no brain fog in me yet, besides being tired all the time more than usual. 

Laughter returns. Attitudes light-hearted again. Are we past this? No, wait, what I mean is, are WE past this? Not the royal "we", but the more immediate, the every-single-day family "we." Are we finally going to test negative? 

And how do we, the royal "we" now, how are we going to actually get past this? I masked all the time at work for so long. I tested every week for 37 weeks; negative results for thirty-seven straight weeks. Now, one week out of work: positive---and sick.

Now two weeks out (maybe more?) and normalcy is returning. A drive to Texas approaches. Summer rolls on. 

And the memories of two weeks being blasted by the 'rona will fade like dysentery in the Lao jungle or driving a diesel Peugeot station-wagon around Sicily. Dreamtime out there, in the Now. Dreamtime...