When I was in 5th and 6th grade, I spent a lot of time in my room, because that’s just what kids that age do. I wrote in my journal and listened to music that I’d recorded from the radio with my pink metallic Sidestep cassette player. I talked on the phone for hours with my friend Katie while we both watched the same bad late night TV, like Nia Peeples’ Party Machine. But a lot of the time, I just hung out, dicking around with my knick-knacks and projects, like carving designs with my fingernails into my wood paneled walls. Nobody was locking me in, but I was definitely locking other people out. I guess 12-year-olds just need a place to sit and stare in peace while they contemplate who tonight’s guest will be on The Arsenio Hall Show.
I’m now midway through Day 9 of my 10 days in COVID isolation and it’s been eerily similar. I’m less of a phone-talker these days, but there’s been a lot of texting with my family, friends, and my old friend Katie, especially. She’s got kids now, so I don’t think she could make it all the way through Nia Peeples anymore--but she did offer to try! She also made an extra effort to call me and pray for me out loud. It’s something she’s always done, so it’s comforting--but it's also a little sad when you can tell that people are scared for you. My dad’s been like that, too--calling me more frequently in the past week than he has in my whole adult life. The first couple of times, he would fight back tears and then blame it on my mom. “I keep telling her, you’re going to be fine!” I try to send out the “Bat Signal” to everyone on a daily basis, so they’ll know I’m still just working through the cold-like symptoms. That seems to satisfy most of those concerned.
I’ve been writing a lot, which also reminds me of being twelve, and I finished reading a book for the neighborhood book club called “The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat”. My sister recommended that I start watching The Haunting of Hill House, but I only made it through the first five minutes. I never even saw ‘The Bent-Neck Lady’ and I don’t fucking want to. That shit can wait until I’m not alone in my bedroom at night. I’ve watched a few episodes of The Home Edit, along with everyone who has a screen. One of the stars is a good friend of mine from high school, and it’s been kinda soothing to watch Joanna being “Joanna” on Netflx--doing well, making puns, and wearing grown-up versions of sweaters I feel like I recognize from 25 years ago. In fact, her show recently inspired me to “edit” the contents of my nightstand, which is probably also a consequence of having an infectious disease. It really makes you want to throw out everything you’ve ever breathed on, so I’m trying not to go TOO crazy with the editing of my life just yet.
I’m happy to report for the sake of my marriage, that I haven’t been compelled to carve any designs into the drywall. Ray would not be happy with me if he had to spackle and paint after an extended period of single-parenting. Meanwhile, he’s been doing a fantastic job with the kids and the house and his job--but I knew he could do it. It’s been a big relief of this whole experience that my husband can carry both his weight and mine through a crisis. The OCD side of him was made for this kind of thing. He might worry you to death about locking doors, checking off to-do’s, and preventing catastrophic plumbing accidents, but he can get things done like nobody’s business. Like all of us, he can be a lot sometimes. But he is never not enough. I will never forget what he’s done for us over the last week and a half.
I’m down to the last 36 hours in my isolation room and I’m feeling pretty decent. I’m tired and a little nauseated at times, but the headache and stuffiness are pretty much gone. There’s a kind of “respiratory malaise” that makes me not want to exert myself, but I’ve never been truly short-of-breath at any time. I never had a fever, which is the one lasting symptom that would keep me confined after Day 10. I did lose my sense of smell about three days ago. They say I should get it back within two weeks and it seriously cannot happen fast enough. Every so often, I’ll catch a phantom whiff of something and get excited, but it’s like seeing something out of the corner of my eye. Otherwise, I could basically huff bleach and not know it until my nose hairs burned off and my eyeballs liquified. It’s the weirdest thing. People ask if my taste has been affected, and that response is mixed. I can taste saltiness, bitterness, sweetness, and spice, but the flavor of things is somehow lost in the absence of its aroma. Crunchy things are entertaining and there’s something about coffee that I can still imagine the smell of, but everything else feels kind of suspect in my mouth without a smell to fill in the blanks. If this persists, I could imagine just mainlining a couple cans of Boost every day, because eating is a lot less fun right now.
Nevertheless, I remain grateful and acknowledge how lucky I am that this wasn’t worse. My husband and kids are ok, and I’m pulling through with what amounts to the weirdest cold of my life. I don’t bore easily and the fifth-grader in me has really enjoyed the opportunity to be alone with my thoughts for the first time in about nine years. I tried to make a slideshow of my surroundings set to “A Whole New World” from Alladin, because I thought my kids might think it was funny to see how uneventful my stay-cation has been. It ultimately didn’t work out, but it makes me laugh to imagine mundane photos of my unmade bed, my thermometer, my tube of Lysol wipes, my pile of contaminated laundry, my garden tub full of hand-washed dishes, and a video clip of my ceiling fan, slowly rotating to enthusiastic lyrics about “a new fantastic point of view”, an “indescribable feeling”, and “time to spare”. When you’ve been inside your own head for 9 days, a stroll from the bed to the bathroom kinda feels like a magic carpet ride. But I do look forward to opening those doors and stepping out onto the landing. I originally thought the Rocky Theme might be in order, but I forget that my kids have been on a real Karate Kid bender lately. “You’re The Best Around” might be more appropriate for the occasion. So if you don’t mind, you’ll have to excuse me. I have to go practice my crane kick.
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