Day 135…
Today is my Mother’s birthday.
She was born between the Wars (closer to the second one) in India to British parents who had, themselves, also been born there. As World War II began, she, her siblings and her mother were evacuated to the nearest British outpost which happened to be South Africa.
She grew up in South Africa until she came of age, then emigrated to England to become a nurse. After giving that a try and deciding that it wasn’t for her, she was hired as a secretarial temp by my father.
One thing led to another and they were married. They lived in various places throughout Europe before moving to the States.
I was born in Arlington, VA, just outside of Washington D.C. and, three years later, my sister was born in Princeton, NJ. A few years later, we moved back to South Africa to live with my Grandfather and then finally returned to the US and settled in Northern New Jersey.
My mother had started working as a Librarian in South Africa and continued doing that in New Jersey at two different Libraries. My sister and I grew up, went off to school and ultimately moved away. After 9/11, my mother and my father moved south to where she still lives to this day.
In Florida.
In India, and in fact, in all of the tropical British colonies at the time, everyone wore topees. We’ve all seen them in movies - the ubiquitous beige pith helmets. Up until the 1950’s it was readily believed that they protected the wearer from getting sunstroke.
My mother and her brother and sister hated wearing them. Mom is the middle sibling and was about five years old when they sailed to South Africa. She remembers that as soon as India disappeared beyond the horizon, the three of them flung their topees into the sea behind the ship - happy to be rid of them for good.
Once this was discovered, all hell broke loose.
If the Germans saw the helmets, they would be able to deduce that a ship had recently passed by there. The ship ended up having to take a zig zag course all the way across for fear of being torpedoed by a German U-Boat.
Thinking about my mother living in Florida at the moment, makes me think about her on board that ship - dodging danger at every turn.
My mother lives south of Jacksonville and north of Orlando. Miami-Dade County to the south is in the worst shape virus-wise of almost anywhere in the country, but Jacksonville and Orlando aren’t all that much better. She is surrounded by hotspots.
Florida reported 12,400 new cases today which brings their total to 400,000. By Monday, they will have pulled past New York. Only California has more cases.
The difference between Florida and New York is that we flattened our curve and aren’t adding new cases at anywhere near the level that they are. To compare, New York had just over 800 new cases reported today.
There is no end in sight to the cases in Florida. They are still spiking - their numbers are heading up at an alarming rate. If they shut everything down right now it would still take them two to three months to get down to where we are in New York. IF they shut everything down, but they aren’t.
Disney World is still open, bringing in people from… everywhere.
Jacksonville to the north was going to be the site of a major gathering for the Republican National Convention. A few days ago, because of their spiking cases, Jacksonville finally started imposing mandates about gatherings and social distancing. The President has just reluctantly cancelled the event.
Seven out of ten people surveyed recently in Florida said that they would feel safe attending the convention.
If you look at infection rates around the country, Florida currently has the highest. In a gathering of 10 people, the probability is about 25% that one person in that group would be carrying the virus. By the time you get to a gathering of 100 people, there is 100% probability that someone in that group will be infected. The convention was expecting 15,000 people to show up. The seven out of ten Floridians who think that they would be safe attending the convention appear to be woefully misinformed.
Florida’s leadership has become somewhat of a grim national joke.
The Governor is optimistic that their case rates don’t appear to be rising. While that might be true, the plateau he is looking at is at an unimaginably high level.
Governor Ron DeSantis’s current approval levels according to a Quinnipiac poll are firmly in the negative. So are Senators Rubio and Scott’s numbers. The same survey shows Joe Biden leading the President by a 13% margin. Florida is a key state that the President must win if he hopes to be re-elected.
Congressman Ted Yoho represents Florida’s 3rd Congressional District. That district lies just to the west of where my mother lives.
On Monday, Representative Yoho ran into NY Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the steps of the US Capitol. In front of a reporter, Yoho said that Ocasio-Cortez was “disgusting” for suggesting that poverty and unemployment were driving a spike in the crime rate in New York City in recent weeks because of the pandemic. He continued with “You are out of your freaking mind.” Ocasio-Cortez told him he was being rude, and they parted ways. As he left, Congressman Ted Yoho, who was with Congressman Roger Williams of Texas muttered, “F&%$ing b&^ch”.
Yesterday, Representative Ocasio-Cortez, in a remarkable eloquent speech to Congress, took Representative Ted Yoho to task for his patriarchy and misogyny. It was a milestone in her short but already amazing career. We are lucky to have that kind of leadership in New York.
Florida…? Not so much with the leadership, apparently.
Michael and I had a nice birthday call with my mother this morning.
Thinking about her dodging COVID-19 torpedoes down there in Florida is, frankly, terrifying.
I do know that she can take care of herself. I know that she’s being careful. She has a small bubble of people that she plays mahjong with. She’s careful when she goes to the store. One of the gifts we gave her is a couple of fancy masks that I got from my mask-guy on 75th Street.
Still, not being able to gather our family together is difficult to bear. I know that everybody around the world is dealing with the same thing.
One of the things that makes all of this truly difficult is not being able to see where it is all going to end. How long is this going to go on?
The CDC seems to have completely caved into the political pressure from the President and are now full-bore recommending that schools reopen in the fall. There seem to be a lot of guidelines in place for the kids and not so many for the adult teachers. Will Governor DeSantis really open Florida’s schools in the midst of his ocean of virus?
Some patients in Texas are now actually being sent home to die if they are too sick. Beds need to be available for those who have a better chance of surviving. That will also be happening in Florida very soon. It’s inevitable.
In addition to my mother I have friends in Florida. I know that many of you also have family and friends there.
Back when this all started everyone was incredibly concerned about how we were doing here in New York. Now, all of us are incredibly concerned about how everyone’s doing there in Florida.
Be safe. Be well. And be smart.
The way we got through everything up here in New York is that we all took care of ourselves, and by doing so, took care of each other. You all in Florida can do exactly the same thing.
My family was all supposed to get on a cruise next week as a kind of birthday celebration for my mother. We were booked on a relatively small ship that was going to sail into ports that the Norwegian Bliss is too big to get into.
Not this year. We’ve rescheduled it for next year. Hopefully, by then, we will all actually be able to go.
In the meantime, we are all home and safe, and, knock wood, well.
That’s as good a gift as anyone could ask for.
Happy Birthday Mom.
Happy Birthday Aunty Angela. I will never forget visiting your house which resembled a museum of the world’s most interesting antiquities. Also, learning to play mah-jong and so loving it!
Happy Birthday to a Mom who channelled a remarkable son
Thank you for the daily facts that keep me in check, grounded in reality
as I continue to live and give
with a mask on
attending A Masquerade Ball
and keeping my dreams
aflame
💕