These Four Walls
(a quarantine log)
From my kitchen window I watch Pete give his husband Wayne a haircut. Wayne clutches a champagne-colored sheet near his heart. Pete trims. Their two dogs weave around their feet and Pete bats them away with his left elbow. Wayne鈥檚 hair falls down the sheet to the grass, blows around in tufts. I like watching all the pieces of this scene. I鈥檓 a floor above them, in the house to the north, leaning on my stove. Pete鈥檚 turn in the chair now, and Wayne takes the clippers. I say to Iris that we should cut each other鈥檚 hair. She says no, she鈥檒l grow it鈥攁nd she is. It鈥檚 long.
*
In the last year, I have taken precut broccoli, yes, and scorched it in a cast iron pot. I have called it dinner and served it on a plate next to rice. This pandemic affords the curated meal. Carbonara from Jeff Smith. Black-bean chili. Dishes that punctuated my thirties and fed my children. Pasta e fagioli, I take my time with you. I drizzle you with olive oil before serving.
*
From my perch on my deck where I鈥檓 trying to learn to finger pick my old Yamaha guitar, I hear thud/thud/thud. I peer over and find the other Pete in my backyard. I live between two Petes. This other Pete, he鈥檚 throwing over the fence we share, back toward his fourteen-year-old son who catches, throws, thud. He says they were planning to ask for forgiveness. He yells up that, when I sing, I sound like someone famous but he can鈥檛 remember who.
*
Like travel brochures for places we might visit in the future, the dating apps show me what might be. It鈥檚 hard to build momentum. I鈥檝e been in quarantine long enough for potential romances to kindle, burn, and die. They have their own rhythms. In this 2-D life, I鈥檓 an image projected on his scrim; he (John, Dan, Allen) is an image on mine. The rubber never meets the road.
*
I can鈥檛 have another April day without pansies. Pansies are essential workers. On our first eighty-degree day, I pay by phone for a flat. Curbside at the garden center, I鈥檓 masked and gloved; so are they. Now I have yellow pansies, hopeful citizens, in my planters. They are immune. I leave one for Pete at his back door. Thundershowers douse it all night.
*
When I was sick, there were no swab tests. Now that I鈥檓 better, there are no antibody tests. My doctor says, Check back with me. I check and she says, Check back.
*
It turns out we don鈥檛 dress for ourselves. Preen, admire, strut: it鈥檚 for others. Without others, I would never wear heels again. I can鈥檛 imagine a quarantine day where I would put on my on-trend black jumpsuit, all the Spanx underneath it, earrings, my red wedges, to sit on my turquoise couch. If you think you dress for yourself, let鈥檚 rumble.
*
Quarantine is so long that it鈥檚 divided into chapters. In early quarantine, I paid Iris to assemble a cabinet I had ordered. I used Goo-Gone grout cleaner on my bathroom floor. We admired the 鈥渘ew鈥 bathroom. When I look at that cabinet now鈥攂eaded and white with its polished nickel pulls鈥攊t looks like a relic.
*
The dogs and I loop and return through the streets of my childhood-turned-adulthood home. I can tell you where my mother and I were walking鈥攕he pregnant with my brother鈥攖hat July day when her water broke. I can show you where I went over my bike鈥檚 handlebars and egged my forehead with the fall. The dogs sniff the whole world with focus. It鈥檚 spring in Chicago, and Chicagoans must stay at home.
*
If my daughter in California falls ill, I will board a plane. If Iris falls ill, I will nurse her. If they fall ill at the same time, span two thousand miles, I don鈥檛 know what I will do. I will atomize.
*
My weekly therapy sessions have moved to FaceTime. I take the call and, for privacy, walk the neighborhood for an hour. I ask Garry about James from Tinder. Is it still dating if you don鈥檛 meet in person? I walk south to the expressway. Garry wants to know what I want out of the experience. 鈥淚t has no future,鈥 I say.
*
Zillow tells me that Nikki has requested to view my property. I give her a virtual tour of the third-floor apartment. We finish on the back patio, looking past Pete and Wayne鈥檚 house, past Eddie鈥檚 and beyond. The little yards are silent, hopeful, turning green.
*
I order a bra and panty set. It鈥檚 the most optimistic thing I do in quarantine.
*
My mother鈥檚 gardens are legion. She grows hydrangeas and trumpet vine, roses and black-eyed susans, hosta and sweet alyssum. She labors with her plants and her weeds and devotes herself to their beauty. If you鈥檙e looking for my mother, you will find her in the garden.
*
Like the golf pro from Tinder with whom I got as far as a FaceTime call. The second I saw his recliner, the TV on in front of it, I knew. I don鈥檛 do recliners. Nothing personal.
*
The day my mother is admitted to the hospital for an allergic reaction is also the day, it turns out, of the COVID-19 peak in Chicago. Something stung her in her garden and her throat closed. The EpiPen she jammed into her leg on the way to the hospital bought her time so the ER doctors could save her life. They admit her and give her a bed. My dad brings her books, a meal, fresh clothes, and a phone charger. He hands them to a nurse at the door.
*
In the mid-Pleistocene, we sort all the photos in their albums. Instead of sprawling over two shelves in two rooms, the photos are now corralled. They chronicle the lives we have lived: the girls with their father when they were small, before our divorce. In the mid-Pleistocene, I also frame five more prints and bang nails into the wall to hang them. The plaster crumbles when the nail enters. I can hear it falling down inside the wall.
*
When call-him-Sean tells me on Tinder that he鈥檚 not staying home because he鈥檚 not a lemming, I unmatch with him posthaste.
*
I read a story in the New York Times about a family whose grandmother was taken to the hospital with COVID symptoms and was lost to the system. They couldn鈥檛 find her or where she was admitted. They cried for days, searching for their grandmother. They presumed she was dead, and perhaps she was. Is. On another day, we might have lost my mother to a ward, to death. I am saying, please don鈥檛 let the grandmothers out of your sight.
*
My sister writes from Berkeley to say residents are leaving sourdough starter in trees for neighbors to take. It鈥檚 nice to have it, if it鈥檚 something you want, she says.
*
The gauzy, white curtains in the living room window are where I left them. My office nook remains untouched. Here鈥檚 the lava lamp, not plugged in. The kitchen stools: sentries. Over the days, guitar sheet music travels on surfaces until it touches six spots: my dresser, the ottoman, the bench, more. On Wednesday, I meet Mike virtually for my guitar lesson. He shows me on the screen how to pick with my whole arm, not my fingers. Swing your arm, he says.
*
I see my friend Dora in the park. She鈥檚 stopped near the water fountain. We鈥檝e been friends since we were ten. She looks puzzled when I wave and doesn鈥檛 know me through the mask, sunglasses and hat. I announce my name to her. 鈥淥h!鈥 We keep walking past each other.
*
Zillow says someone else is interested in my apartment for rent. She writes she is an 鈥渆xec.鈥 If you are an 鈥渆xec,鈥 why do you want to rent my crappy apartment?
*
We invent games and play them. Tonight鈥檚 game is How Fast Can Mommy Type? I turn to a page of Terry Tempest Williams, fix my eyes there and go. After one minute, I have 84 words and one error. So, 83 words. I dazzle Iris. I would make someone a great secretary.
*
I don鈥檛 like the fear and I don鈥檛 invite it in. But I strap my mask on鈥攑ink鈥攁nd I cross the street when anyone comes toward me. The fear is shaking me by the lapels and announcing, I鈥檓 here.
*
Friday, we drive to the loop to see it empty. We think police will stop us on the way, turn us back home. They hover, but they don鈥檛 stop us. We exit at Franklin and drive toward my office where the lunch places clutch like a pearl necklace. All the crosswalks seem haunted. It鈥檚 not as funny as we thought it would be. It鈥檚 sad and desperate. It鈥檚 the same day that COVID-19 cases balloon at Cook County Jail, where there鈥檚 no distancing, no ride home, where no one can leave.
*
A distanced walk with a friend is all. A family Zoom call is all. A virtual lesson is all. A slow and simmering meal is all. Sun on my face is all and everything. I search out the good and lovely. I fill my gratitude jar with the names of the people I miss.
*
On the night John Prine dies of COVID-related causes, I break my Facebook fast. I find my friends there, posting his songs and sad emoji face with a large tear creeping down the cheek. I play three of his songs for Iris. They are small, musical poems about people messing up, people loving hard. She is patient and I try to grip the pick lightly, try to swing my arm.
*
I am out of mascara. Iris says it鈥檚 not essential, but I need mascara for Zoom calls.
*
Apropos of Tinder matches, I text my friend Mimi and ask her if she鈥檚 ever dated someone eighteen years younger than she is. She writes back: 鈥淚 would date a grizzly bear right now.鈥
*
Iris attends a Zoom seminar-for-credit at her future college. The topic is the COVID pandemic we are living through. Zack the dog throws up at her feet while she鈥檚 introducing herself to her discussion group. I live in Chicago, I love languages and politics, she says. Then she mutes herself to ask me to clean up the mess.
*
Good morning, I text a shockingly young man I seem to be virtually dating. Hey beautiful, he texts me back.
*
On the day my mother is discharged from the hospital, the nurses wheel her off the floor. They steer her into the elevator and push the L button with gloved hands, wheel her out through the automatic doors where my dad is waiting for her. I text her that April is beautiful, that she鈥檚 living, that we鈥檙e both still on this beautiful earth together, and that Bernie dropped out of the race as a special gift to her so the Dems can consolidate and win. My dad drives her to Walgreens to pick up her prescriptions. They return to their contagion-free shelter by the lake. Waiting.
*
Open the windows. Close the windows. Morning, night. Snow, sun. A day. Another day. Beads on a string, but only for the lucky.
*
I dream I meet a man where skin occurs, a place beyond masks. We鈥檙e on the Riverwalk downtown, a normal year. A crush of people and no danger. There it is, I say, cupping his thick beard. Here you are, I say, taking his hand. On this thirty-third day of quarantine, I wake and shake the dream off, brew coffee. I don鈥檛 know who I will meet at the end of the story. (Hi beautiful.) I know I will remember to wear my new, hopeful lingerie. (Can you date someone solely by text?) I know I will be embodied. 3-D. Blazing sun, loved man with a name I speak. That鈥檚 how I will know it鈥檚 over. I will feel us holding on.
Cameron Gearen鈥檚 full length collection, Some Perfect Year, came out from Shearsman Press in 2016. Her essays and poems have appeared in the Washington Post, Chicago Magazine, Hippocampus, Dame Magazine,the Antioch Review, Green Mountains Review, and many other journals. From 2017鈥2019, she was the writer-in-residence at the Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park. Follow her on Instagram: @camerongearen