Living in the Epicenter: Notes from NYC in the Time of Coronavirus
Part II: Try Not to Explode
In the apartment I quarantine in, there are three rooms available to me: bedroom, bathroom, and combination living room/kitchen. It is hard to overstate my familiarity with these rooms. The five-pronged lamp in the corner of the living room, and its configuration of bulbs. The fleck of paint in the bathroom sink. The folds in the dishtowel, hanging from the handle of the refrigerator door.
As the day passes, I cycle through these rooms as one might daytime TV shows, looking for something fresh. But like daytime TV shows, the rooms never really change. The kitchen is the same kitchen it was yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that. The Price is Right is The Price is Right is The Price is Right.
At its best, it feels like meditation. As the hunger for stimuli deepens, sensitivity heightens, and the smallest change in the apartment feels epic. The plant beside the window twists towards the light. The tube of toothpaste flattens and curls. Yesterday, the guitar case was on one side of the living room. Today, it’s on the other. Fascinating.
At its worst, it feels like a cage. Pacing from one end of the apartment to the other, I become a chimpanzee, walking the perimeter of the monkey house, anxious to see something new. Napping through lunch, I become an apathetic tiger, sleeping the day away in the big cat exhibit, because it knows nothing new is coming. As we enter month two of lockdown, my feelings tend towards this extreme.
Last week, I wrote of an eerie sense of calm. This week, the walls are closing in, an itchy wanderlust has settled in my gut, and part of me wants to explode. It’s time for a walk.
From the Northeast side of Astoria Park, the powder blue swoop of RFK Bridge frames a section of the Upper East Side. Walking towards it, the space beneath the bridge shifts, encapsulating bigger buildings, more of the East River, and more of Randall’s Island on the opposing bank. As the perspective lengthens, the muscles in my neck unclench with an audible click. A seagull passes over me. Salt air fills my nostrils. A sunbeam warms my forehead, relaxing the space between my eyebrows.
As I enter Astoria Park proper, my tension returns. Pandemic be damned, the park is full of people. We line the sidewalks and fill the fields. We sit on every bench. Most of the walkers don’t even try to maintain a six-foot buffer, and many don’t wear masks. There’s something very New York about their attitude, plowing ahead, grim-faced and smiling. Outta my way Coronavirus. I’m walkin’ here. It would be funny, if the stakes weren’t life and death.
I lay down in a patch of clover, and stew in self-righteous rage. With so many people in the park, we cannot possibly all be minimizing our time outside. I’ve been inside for three days; my walk is a mental health necessity. Can the people in the skatepark say the same? Are those kickflips for the greater good? I scowl at the skaters. Their mask-free smiles make me sick.
Behind me, I hear a bark. It belongs to a caramel-colored puppy, trotting towards a tree on the far side of the field I’m sitting in. A squirrel flicks its tail in the low branches. The puppy hides itself in the tall grass, shoulders rolling as it creeps forward. The squirrel twitches, unaware.
For a second, I am on the African savannah, watching a lion stalk a gazelle. There is no coronavirus, no over-crowded park, only the struggle between predator and prey. When the dog can wait no longer, it charges. The squirrel turns tail and shimmies up the tree. The puppy places its forepaws on the trunk, yapping at its would-be prey.
My gaze slips back to the skate park. I try to let my indignation slip away. How could I know what the skaters are going through? Maybe their time at the skatepark is all they have. Like the puppy, I too am learning to choose my battles.
There is only one pandemic, but there are eight billion experiences of it. To judge the experience of anyone but myself is pointless, illogical, and sad. Were it not for the grace of a puppy, I would have let it ruin a good walk.
There is no great revelation when I return to the rooms I live in. The state of the world remains the same. The claustrophobia of quarantine remains the same. The Price is Right remains the same. But I’m breathing a little easier, and today, that’s more than enough.
