Day 369…
As I came up from the subway station on our street yesterday, a woman was crossing out of Central Park towards me ringing a bell.
She was both deliberate and completely nonchalant in how she rang it and met my eye for a second as she passed without any sense of self-consciousness at all.
Thinking how strange this was, I headed towards home and slowly realized that it was 7:00pm. She was applauding our health care workers. Even after all this time, the 7:00pm neighborhood twilight barking in support of them all still happens in some fashion.
I walked towards home and saw that an older couple was standing on their front steps applauding and I could hear someone else banging on a pot from an apartment above me. I started clapping, too, as I went home.
Because we sprang forward on Sunday morning, the sun was just setting, and it was still light outside. It didn’t feel like 7:00pm at all.
On Friday, the greatest number of people who have traveled since the pandemic began passed through our nation’s airports. There were still nearly 40% fewer people flying than usual, but, nonetheless, it was a notable milestone.
Between the vaccine rolling out, the warmer weather and businesses like movie theatres starting to reopen, it is starting to feel as if our long winter wait is over.
Unfortunately, it isn’t.
Europe, largely because of the spread of the new UK variant, is heading into what they believe is a third wave. Severe restrictions have been reimposed in Italy as of this morning in order to try and stop it. The entire nation is going to be considered a “red zone” over Easter to keep people from gathering and spreading the virus during the holiday.
Cases are climbing in Germany. Hospitalizations are up in France. Overcrowding is such a problem in Paris health care facilities that patients there are being evacuated from there to other places around the country to relieve the pressure. The UK variant contributed to Great Britain holding the record for the highest number of COVID-related fatalities in Europe and the rest of the continent is taking that threat very seriously.
Nearly a dozen countries have just halted their use of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine after it was discovered that it might be causing sometimes fatal blood clots in some people. That still hasn’t been confirmed, but the already slow vaccine roll out in some of those places has just gotten noticeably slower.
We haven’t approved that particular vaccine over here yet in part because the FDA was concerned about transparency from the manufacturers. There were reports that some severe neurological complications arose in a couple of trial patients and they were improperly reported and accounted for.
Still, that vaccine’s efficacy does seem to have turned the tide of new infections in England. The company is standing by their vaccine saying that the few cases of complications out of millions are still at a rate well below that of any vaccine.
Two weeks ago, the Dutch health minister assured the Netherlands that there was nothing to worry about. This morning their vaccination program has been halted for two weeks to make sure.
A year ago, we looked at what was going on in Italy and in the rest of Europe and the overwhelming sense in this country was that it was all happening “there” and couldn’t happen “here”. A year later, it feels like we are doing the same thing.
Our health officials are not. Dr. Fauci is urging all of us to keep wearing masks and maintain social distancing to prevent a third wave happening here, but despite that, many places are ignoring him.
The Governors of Mississippi, Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, West Virginia and Texas all lifted mask wearing and indoor gather limits last week. They join states like Georgia and Alaska who never had them and, of course, Florida, whose inept leadership has proven to be extremely lethal to the people living there during the pandemic.
Of course, the virus isn’t looking at the calendar, but passing the year anniversary and surpassing President Biden’s 100 million doses being administered pledge so much earlier than expected, coupled with the warmer weather made it seem as if we were all finally out of the woods. In 1919, there was a third wave of the Spanish flu and it is now starting to feel inevitable that the same thing is going to happen here.
I am not comfortable yet with some of the easing of restrictions here in New York. Michael and I met up with some friends that we hadn’t seen in a year on Saturday for a walk. We waited until we found a restaurant with well-spaced outdoor seating before we sat down for a meal. They were open for limited indoor seating but none of us were ready for that.
The AMC movie theatre near us on Broadway has reopened albeit with limited seating. The yellowing and dusty movie posters announcing the opening of new movies last March were finally replaced with new vibrant ones. I don’t know what happened to all of those other movies. If they actually got released anywhere, I wasn’t aware of it.
I don’t think that I could watch a movie for several hours indoors and not worry about the virus. I’m not ready to take that chance.
Last month, the “Coming in March” taglines started to seem relevant again. There are still Riverdance posters in the subways announcing March performances. It’s only because of how old and faded they now look that I can tell that they were from last year.
I’m finding that time isn’t passing in hours these days so much as it’s passing in weeks. That my second shot of the vaccine is scheduled for just a few days ahead seems inconceivable.
Having the extra hour of daylight didn’t really change the length of my day yesterday. If anything, it actually shortened it a bit because I got home later than usual and my typical hour of catching up on things before dinner disappeared.
We met up with a couple of other people earlier on Sunday and went into Central Park with our beach chairs and thermoses. We sat in a nice, wide circle. We’ve been doing that regularly throughout this past year. Our gatherings lasted well into the fall but, except for one bright snowy day last month, we pretty much put them on hold for the winter.
Yesterday was a beautiful day - chilly but not freezing and very sunny. It was nice to be back outside together. As we talked, the conversation came around to a discussion about whether we were ready to go back. What would that look like? What did we want it to look like?
After a year without being able to do much of what we had been doing before, we all agreed that while we were ready to get back to work that none of us wanted things to return exactly as they were. Time off of the hamster wheel has made us all a bit leery of getting back onto it.
Our business is going to reopen slowly despite what happens around us. We are going to watch what happens in the movie theatres and be careful as we try to do the same. We are going to watch what is going on everywhere else, too. This summer, I am sure that we will begin to see smaller theatres and the not-for-profits begin to present some material, but I remain certain that Broadway is not going to reopen in any meaningful way until it can really reopen. That means full houses. Full houses means that tourists will need to be able to freely come back to New York.
That time will come, but not if we rush back into all of our pre-pandemic lives all at once. Doing that will only prolong the time that we have to wait.
I am eager to work, but I find myself unwilling to contemplate fully giving up all of the daily routines that I’ve created for myself this last year. I’ve tried to live my life by saying yes rather than no. Much of what I have agreed to do over the years that fell out of my comfort zone at the time turned out to be great heart and mind-opening experiences.
Moving forward, I will likely still say yes to those new things that seem challenging. Yes, but…
This year has shown me that I can actually exist without working seven days a week and being available at all times of the day and night. I’ve been rewired. I don’t mind being crazy busy for bursts of time, but I don’t want it to grow back into being all of the time the way that it was.
My wanting or not wanting that may be moot. When we reopen our industry, it isn’t going to be as the same industry that we closed. We need to do it with an eye to letting more people into the club. As more people get a voice, what and how we do things will change and grow.
We need to teach ourselves how to open up our expectations and then we are going to need to teach our audiences how to do the same. If we are going to remain viable and relevant, we are going to have to figure out how to attract a more diverse crowd of people into our performance spaces.
And we will. I am very much looking forward to being a part of that.
That is all still to come. For now, though, we just need to keep doing what we are doing. We need to follow the mandates as best we can and keep being patient.
We need to get to the point where our health care workers can get off of their own hamster wheels. There is a limit to how long we can expect these incredible people to be able to keep up with the spin.
We’ve already lived our lives this way for a solid year, what’s a few extra weeks or even months?
We’ve got this.
All of this.
❤️maybe the woman ringing the bell for the essential workers is a reminder of what isnt over
what I still must do essentially to live in COVID the winter is over, COVID is not. I am ok with trusting this epic pause this global silent standstill my acting teacher also told me there is no such thing as “nothing” I think I responded to this “nothingness” in the loudest silence I ever heard. I also believe we did not wait, we “worked” on ourselves
for me in the most “ essential” way I am great full this day 🙏💞🌞