April 18

We’re a ways into this. A month ago, I noted in my journal something facetious about love in the time of Covid-19 and posted a photo of a soufflé I made. These days, I’m paranoid about what I say on social media. I parse everything until I ask myself why bother in the first place. I don’t want to inadvertently do something that leads to unintended consequences.

I want to be as careful as Trump is as he navigates the American people out of this mess. Foot clearly in mouth.

Nowadays, most of us don’t go out unless it’s to buy groceries. Even this routine event is changed beyond all recognition. These days, we ‘gown up’. I have made home-made masks out of t-shirts and Ronald wears a neck scarf. Regardless of the weather, I wear long sleeves and jeans. I’m a good citizen but equally I don’t know what the f*ck I’m doing because no one’s got a handle on this virus and for all I know, the woman who sneezed in Walgreens the other week has infected me with her droplets. Stay tuned.

Before, we’d do the rounds of the various food stores if and when we needed supplies: HEB, Central Market, TJ’s, the Farmers’ Market downtown on a Saturday. Like good yuppies, we’d graze our way round town, looking for the choicest morsels. Now it’s only TJs every 12 or so days. We line up 6-feet apart from the person in front of us while staff let people in only as others leave. Only 25 are allowed into the store at a time.

I maintain wary distance from the young mother and her toddler as they decide on the raspberries while also getting impatient when they dawdle too long. What? You need to be somewhere in a hurry, Alexa? The staff at TJs are so much more visible to me. Before CV-19 I wasn’t oblivious but I certainly didn’t look at them and think ‘frontline’. And now they are. And their very job takes on a gravitas that would’ve been laughable at the beginning of the year.

We wear disposable gloves and take lysol wipes along with our re-usable bags. Everything gets wiped down as we exit the jeep. Then we wipe down again when we return with our groceries. And then we ruin our efforts by not wiping our goods down when we get home. DUH.

This is one tiny example of the pandemic mind shift. We take it seriously but it’s impossible to be vigilant all the time. I hope we don’t learn the hard way.