It’s May and Lockdown Continues, Reading Stack During a Pandemic, Celebrating a Melancholy Birthday

Path of fallen cherry blossoms, on my birthday

Celebrating a Melancholy Birthday During Quarantine

So, on a quiet, blowy spring day on the last day of April, I turned 47 during a pandemic. I was going to throw a “Roaring 20s Writer Party” for my birthday, and I even had a flapper dress all ready, but then, you know, coronavirus. So instead we spent a more melancholy birthday close to home. Check out this bower of fallen cherry blossoms petals on the road of a closed winery. Melancholy in one photo, right?

Orange azaleas

Glenn did try to make my birthday as normal as possible – he baked a gluten-free black forest cake, we went and looked at goslings, climbed a hill to smell wisteria in bloom and took this shot of orange azaleas. To celebrate, he got me two sets of flowers, a box of produce, and steaks from Pike Place Market (here’s where you can get a Pike Place box – you’ll be supporting local vendors, and $5 goes to the Pike Place Market Safety Net Fund.) And I did wear my party dress briefly, anyway. I read poetry and relaxed with a great dinner and had lots of phone calls from family and friends. Not a terrible apocalypse birthday, after all.

Sylvia posing with my Open Books birthday package

Reading Poetry During the Pandemic

Have you been wondering what to read during the pandemic?

I just got the birthday package I ordered from Seattle’s Open Books (again, trying to keep our local businesses alive) with Victoria Chang’s Obit and Natalie Diaz’s Postcolonial Love Poem.

And, if you want to know what I’ve been reading, the Poetry Foundation web site asked contributors to April’s Poetry Month issue what we were reading.
Here’s the link to read the whole thing, and a clip of my list.

Poetry Foundation Reading List

Wisteria at a closed winery

May and Lockdown Continues

So, our governor has extended Washington State’s lockdown til May 31. Some things are opening: state parks and elective surgery, some construction. I have a lot of health problems and know I’m at high risk so I’m glad they’re being safe rather than sorry. Some states that opened too soon (Georgia, North Carolina) are already experiencing increased cases. I feel terrible for small business owners, for people who can’t run their businesses during the shutdown. Restaurants in particular will be hard hit. Glenn was working from home since February, and probably will until this fall; even Amazon has announced its tech employees can work from home til October. One in five people in Seattle have filed for unemployment. Meanwhile, things break: cell phones, stand mixers, my laptop. We learn to try to cut our own hair.

Hummingbird with its tongue out

I will admit I miss some things – book stores, coffee shops, seeing my little brother on the weekend or taking a trip to one of the beautiful areas around Washington State. Walking around without being terrified of other people; remember that? This month I usually visit Skagit Valley’s tulip festival, hike around the waterfall at Ollalie State Park, or take a trip to Port Townsend or Bainbridge Island. This month, of course, we’re staying close to home. This is one of the only months that we can get outside (too much rain the rest of the year, wildfires during midsummer) so I understand that people are restless.

Purple lilacs

So, we continue to get by with grocery deliveries and walks around our neighborhood (to avoid people, I mostly walk around abandoned office parks and closed wineries, tbh) and spring continues to bloom. This week, lilacs, azaleas, wisteria. Our lilies were eaten by rabbits (or deer maybe?) but we continue to plant things in the garden.

Tomorrow, which will be good, I’m having a Zoom poetry submission party. I haven’t been submitting as much as I’ve been writing, and I have no idea if anything I’m writing is any good. I’m still looking for a publisher for two of my book manuscripts.

All my ambitious goals haven’t really happened: trying watercolor painting again, learning Japanese for real, but I have been keeping up with reading, learning new skills (like Zoom and haircutting (men’s clippers are hard!) and getting used to physical therapy exercises done by myself with advice by iphone from my physical therapist and virtual doctor appointments (which, frankly, are better than the real thing, no waiting rooms and far fewer needles.) We did a Zoom birthday get-together for my older brother’s birthday, and I’m surprised by how much those wear me out, although it’s a good way to see siblings in multiple states (Tennessee, Ohio, WA.)

For my birthday wishes: I’m hoping our country can get more antibody tests out and a couple of good working treatment options so coronavirus can become less deadly. I’m hoping not to catch covid-19 myself and I do not want to die. I know things will not go back to “normal” for a while, maybe years, maybe masks will become “normal” and cruises will disappear, working and studying from home with become “normal,” and virtual book tours will replace “in-person” author appearances. Maybe our environment will heal a little bit during our downtime. Maybe people will start to realize how important it is to take care of other people, that we are willing to pay a little bit more in order to ensure people have food, health care, and education, that we are willing to clean a little more and wash our hands more to keep others safe. Maybe I’m being optimistic. I picture a world with more birdsong, less traffic, more kindness and appreciation for the people who make our lives possible, like farmers and health care workers and delivery people, a world that embraces science and technology to make life better for everyone. Okay, before this post gets too sentimental, let me wish you a happy, safe, and well May, wherever you are, that you can see some birds and smell some flowers, read some poetry, and be kind to each other. Apocalypses are much better with poetry, flowers, and kindness.