Central Park: Full of Ghosts

 By the time I post this, the number of deaths from the pandemic will be at 500,000, half a million dead. Can you grasp such a number? Can you?

Back in the early 1980's, I remember listening to a live broadcast of the Simon and Garfunkel reunion concert in Central Park, NYC. The news came out that there were half a million people at the concert, a mind bending amount that not even Simon or Garfunkel knew until they were back at their separate apartments after the show and were watching the news. They could not comprehend that number, and they were in the middle of it. Well, I don;t think that we cna comprehend it for the same reason.

In a short time, it will be a year since the lock down. I don;t think there is a person out there who does not know of someone who has not gotten the virus, been hospitalized by it, or died from it. But, when there is no way of stopping the numbers from rising, perspective becomes impossible. One only fully begins to understand the destruction of war once armistice has been called. The amount of winning or loss only comes from one leaves the gambling table. We are in the middle of this and it is far from ending.

Let me clarify that last statement. I know of people who have gamed the system and gotten the vaccine even though they do not fit the requirements to get it. Yes, they lied and got the vaccine. It seems easy enough if you are willing to drive over an hour to get it. While I am more than willing to drive that far, I just can't do such a thing because of, well, karma. Yes, there are debates that it does not matter because if it is not used, the vaccine will be disposed of at the end of the day. Fair enough to the lucky few who wind up in the right place at the right time and get it. But, it just feels very smarmy to lie and get it early.

There is a long road till this is over in full. The news is saying that, by the present calculations, by the end of the Summer, most people will have gotten the vaccine. But, life going back to anything close to normal will not happen by the end of the year. Also note, Winter will begin at the end of December, so vaccines will most likely be needed again for the new year. I have been isolated so long that I cannot comprehend the Summer, much less another Winter. The days just flow onward the same as the previous. Anything that you may want to do today, you can just put off till tomorrow. 

But let's follow the money for the real plan. As I was driving home from the post office, I heard that the behemoth concert promoter, Clear Channel, has booked many outdoor shows in NYC for the Summer. I believe that I have heard that the NYC Opera will be opening in the Autumn. There are millions and millions of dollars at stake and these organizations are desperate to get back to making money, so their best guess seems to be something of a safe bet. The numbers of deaths and infections IS going down, but the new variants of the virus may cause another spike. Vaccine distribution, while better, is still a mess. 

So, if you get a chance, go online and search for Simon and Garfunkel's Concert in Central Park. The music is great and the stage setting is very cool. But, when they do a crowd shot or when you hear the crowd go bonkers for one of the songs, try to imagine a silence and mass death of that size. I am willing to bet you can't. No on can, as Camus said in "The Plague". As humans, we cannot comprehend the death of a single person in our lives that we care about. 

Half a million deaths and counting and we cannot even grasp the number 1.

On the Persistance of Time, Memory, and Habit

 I haven't posted in some time because....what is time these days?

I have taken my hit for the team and stayed in isolation for a year so as not to get, nor spread, the virus that is now mutating into a more virulent strain. But the "hit' for the team has broken me and I have lost all hold of my past life. And it sucks.

I understand that, on paper, this should now be the most hopeful of times. We have a new administration. We have three vaccines being produced for the masses. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. While all this is true, no one ever tells you how long the tunnel is, regardless of how brightt he light in the distance may be.

As of this writing, there are ways of cheating/gaming the system to have someone like me get a vaccine before I am supposed to. I could lie about my health, saying I am a smoker, I have high blood pressure, etc. If I did this, I could be considered someone who is at high risk and, if I were to hunt the internet and search like a bloodhound on meth for ANY opening ANYWHERE in New Jersey, I could get the vaccine and, within eight weeks, have my freedom back. I say this because I know of more than a few people who have gamed the system and gotten vaccinated early. Trust me, you can do it.

But this is not as cut and dry as it seems, or may seem. If one happens to be at a place that has extra vaccine at the end of the day, you can simply get it so they do not throw it away. It is literal Life Lottery. But even if you get it, even of you were allowed freedom upon the next sunrise, you would awaken into a world that is not what you used to have. You cannot go out to eat. All theaters are closed. All that you remembered as a life is gone, or, at the very least, deeply changed. That persistence of hopes and memories you have will not align with the world outside. You may be able to go to the gym as much as you like, but you will never be able to go see a play on Broadway or anywhere else. 

Also, riding demonic shotgun on this ride, is the fact that the news is now full of live reporting from the second impeachment of the past president. So, for the next many days, we shall be watching more and more of old and new footage of the insurrection that nearly collapsed the government a month ago.  And, like any prosecution worth their salt, the people are showing new and more disturbing footage of the events. Just when you thought you could breath easy, memories of a past most of us would like to forget are coming back and being put on repeat all day, every single day. While I believe that one should not forget the crimes of the past so as not to repeat them, it is all a bit much.

Personally, time has lost any reference to the past. I have slept more in the past year than I did the past ten. Literally. My life of caffeine and motion has been reduced to just doing what needs to be done for the day and nothing more. And I know that I am blessed because I can pull this off and not be thrown out of my house and still not go hungry. Yes, my perspective is blessed and I would be a horrible human being to say as such. Yet, it would be a lie to say that I am not broken by this situation. Even if my place is not one of either abject poverty or insane wealth, I believe it must be told. Why? Because I am sure that there are many other people like me who need their stories told within this plague.

I shall persist to go onward into this unknown. My best guess is, unless something amazing happens, I will be getting vaccinated somewhere in the Summer. But once one is vaccinated, you still have to stay inside for a few weeks to have the antibodies replicate. I look forward to writing about waiting within hope. But now, I am waiting within a theoretical hope based on things that have yet to even begin to develop.

Know you can persist within a plague, but know your memories and habits can be both bricks and wings upon your back.