The following is the opinion and analysis of the writer:
I missed seeing my friends down at The Arroyo Cafe. We stay connected online. On Monday Carlos shot me an email. “Sad about Richard Elías. Good man.”
“Sad about the rest home. All those people.” We repeat the news of the day to each other endlessly.
I sent a group email to Rosa, Carlos, Romero, Lurlene, Elena, Phil Arroyo and Frank. “Have you all noticed the world is falling quiet? Some days all I hear outside my door is the sound of songbirds and the wind. Almost no cars. The streets are growing still.”
Lurlene replied to all, “We can hear roosters in the morning clear across the barrio. Did you hear the Grand Canyon was closed?”
Rosa responded with a weeping emoji. “They need it to hold the nation’s tears.”
People are also reading…
Sour Frank told us he finds hearing Southern Pacific roar into town on schedule is comforting. “Next to an empty I-10.”
I replied, “It’s like it’s 1896 out there.”
Sour Frank corrected me. “1348.”
Carlos and I chatted on FaceTime on Thursday. Carlos, Mister Macho, shocked me when he confessed he was scared. “I feel powerless, amigo.”
When I’m on a turbulent flight I look at the flight attendant’s face for the smile that reassures me you’ll survive this, the plane will land and you will be OK. I gave him my best flight attendant’s smile.“You aren’t powerless, my friend. You are saving lives right now. You are stopping this virus.”
We’re all scared. As long as you stay at home, wash your hands, practice distancing, and are very, very, very careful you will make it to the other side of this. “I hear your fear, brother. We are going to walk through this valley of death together. The entire world. This will change us. We will save ourselves and with hard-earned wisdom and unity we will save our planet. And one day I will say to you, in person, I’d like more sour cream on that burrito.”
On my walk later that day I saw people chatting outside in tight circles. A killer virus is on the loose and they’re playing “Tag, you’re infected.” I saw kids playing a basketball game. Each foul shook loose a mist of corona virus droplets that could kill their parents or grandparents. I saw geezers sharing golf carts and microbes. I saw “one last swim in the community pool with our friends” in a microbial soup.
I ate in my garden and envied the bees working, dancing and buzzing with each other. Absence makes the heart envy social insects.
I saw Rosa on Tuesday when I ordered breakfast to go. I pulled up across the street from the Arroyo Cafe, honked and rolled down my window. I prefer to stay 18 feet away from folks, tripling my odds. I plucked the bag of warm, delicious Arroyo Cafe grub off the end of Rosa’s pitchfork and set it down on the seat next to me. I took my slingshot out of the glove compartment and fired my debit card into Rosa’s catcher’s mitt. “Rosa. I like those surgical gloves. Been performing appendectomies on burritos all morning?”
Who was I to talk? I was wearing matching a bandanna, goggles and a pair of “Kiss the Cook” barbecue mitts. (If any reader is dumb enough to actually start using barbecue mitts for protection against this deadly horrible terrifying virus then all I have to say is two words: natural selection.)
She came back outside and presented me my receipt to sign on a nail on the end of a 10-foot pole with a pen dangling from a string.
I was not touching that plague-riddled deadly quill. “You shouldn’t do that, Rosa. Spreads the virus. Hold on. I got one.” Being a cartoonist I had 17 pens of varying quality, length, color, and nib durability scattered in all my pockets to choose from. I signed it.
Before leaving I had to ask. “How’s it goin’? You OK?”
“We’re good. Learned something new today. It’s amazing how much Lysol Disinfectant my kid’s swimming pool blaster soaker bazooka can hold. See you tomorrow.”
“Best to Carlos. Love to all of ya.’”
“Love you, too. Elbow tap.” We’re all telling each other we love each other these days.
At home, after I washed my hands like the otter at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum on an all-espresso regimen, I marked my calendar. On Wednesday I’d return to the Arroyo Cafe for more comfort food.
