I found more posts from early in the Pandemic. This from April 22, 2020.
Once upon a time:
I sat on my fire~escape this afternoon reading the New Yorker.
Bright sun fresh breezes. Industry is sleeping as the air is fresh...I even sensed the ocean just a few miles away. Normally it might as well be hundreds.Reading on there was a piece on how the Virus will decimate the country's homeless. It may well. I see them all the time as do you.
They have no masks because they have no money.
They can't shelter in place because they have no homes.
The city shelters like prisons or Navy ships are hot spots of infection.
So most Homeless stay away.
I think I mentioned seeing our blessed EMT folks removing bodies from homes. My 'Hood is a hot spot. The whole of the Emerald City is, but some areas worse than others. Queens was the first serious area now Brooklyn seems to have the crown. It moves around.
700 to 800 people are perishing in the Emerald City a day now.
They say it will level off. There's that lag time from infection to going critical to hospital to death. As less people are out less get infected. Lower numbers will take time.
That, and all the COVID deaths may not be getting counted. Some of those dying at home are perishing of other causes made worse by the Virus so are technically in another group.
Me I'm just sitting here reading at the end of the world.
Fran Leibowitz sez in the New Yorker that she has a special kind of sadness seeing the City she loves like this.
A Meadow without flowers trees or restaurants."
Of course I showered when I came in, and put my things in a laundry bag sprayed with disinfectants.
The trees are budding much more than when I was last out. Also Army helicopters buzzing about now, and then. Huey's, and Chinooks,...NY Air National Guard I assume. All is quiet.
I assume the distributors are not topping off the locals,...holding back. A wait, and see. The library was closed. A note said fewer days new shorter hours. Also directions to the main branch downtown. This has a quarter day schedule.
The food take outs except for the chains were shut.
The Haitian Chinese Hispanic, and Indian take outs either closed or on shortened times.
Maybe one in six wearing masks.
Btw the drug store was out of these all week so far. Folks speaking to each other. ...without masks,...but still. New Yorker's open up when shit hits the fan. Folks telling their personal war stories of this thing. Blessing each other.
I'm listening to WQXR while posting this. These guys are one of the last Classical Station's in the region. We used to have several. They're reading listener email. Many artists in the audience. Musicians laid off from season concerts.
The World health Organization has finally declared COVID-19 a Pandemic. Being an Elder with Diabetes I should self quarantine now. Being a partial shut-in this won't be a problem. I'll have to make arraignments for shopping though. So yes I take this seriously. I lived through Polio, and AIDS. This one is different...very different. It's spreading like the last big one the 1918 Spanish Flu. I'm glad the WHO are finally being honest. It's a Pandemic. The use of the "P" word was held back I'm sure for economic reasons. That's as far as I go with any conspiracy. In fact it's likely been a Pandemic since Nov./December 2019. Certainly since January. We don't know because it wasn't taken seriously till now,...when it's too late. Please everyone be cautious be safe be smart,...but most of all be kind.
In the Emerald City the schools were shut possibly till fall. Bars cafe's shops closing. Basically the City is going offline. Folks bunkering up.
NYS Governor Cuomo decried that lack of Federal leadership. Said there's "...chaos" throughout the country. This as each State is making it's own rules many of which conflict with the States around them.
As for the Feds,...like #45 said, "...it will disappear like a miracle."
In a cab coming home from Hospital where I finally got my meds. We listened as Cuomo said that there will be the need to build Hospitals as the Chinese did from scratch to deal with this.
The Feds have to do this via the Army Corps of Engineers, and civil construction companies. Them guys in China put those things up in about a month. Amazing what can be done when ya life depends on it.
My cabbie said that his family in Haiti are okay. As far as he knows it's not there yet. I'll have to look that up. More folks on the streets are wearing masks now. At a glance maybe twice as many since before this past weekend.
These coming months the balance of this year will be trying.
We'll make it. We just will.
March 3, 2020.
Went to market the shelves were somewhat light. No bread little dairy no fresh meat. Tons of canned good though. Those $14 dollar packs of hot dogs are still sitting there. I think folks are refusing to buy them. Pandemic price gouging is a crime, but still not enforced. The upside no crazy crowds like last time. I think it was general apprehension plus #45’s insane speech that sent folks rushing to the shops.
I just read Spain might lock down. In another week or so. It’s moving fast now. Remember have enough for at least a week,…more if you can. Plus bottles of water. These are still cheap. At least for now.
Be thoughtful take reasonable precautions. Put a backup supply of non-perishables aside...that, and all the Chocolate you can carry.
Keep cool, but prepare.
February 27, 2020.
Locally bleep is happening. Our governor has put a wide ring around New Rochelle a town just north of the Emerald City. That btw was the commuter town where Rob Petrie of the early 1960's Dick van Dyke show lived,...no it wasn't fictional it's a real place.
Btw some now call it "New Roach Hell".
Public gatherings are prohibited, and other measures are being taken. For example the NY National Guard Bio-Units are involved with disinfections some public areas.
The Gov sez this is the largest Cluster in the Nation. ..............??!!!
How the fuck did that happen?!!
He calls it a "Containment Area". I better get serious about laying in a vast supply of instant noodles Diet Pepsi, and sugar-free Chocolate.
We're being told to bathe, and shower a few times a day. Wash every time we go out. Use rubbing alcohol if hand sanitizer ain't around, and it ain't. I've never been so clean in my life. I may get sick, but at least I'll smell nice.
Which after all is what really matters.
I’ve been gathering posts from my pandemic Journals. Not that anyone will read them. No one wants to remember. Like the 1918 pandemic this will vanish. A few grainy videos not much more. Despite currently a Million perished. This even with new vaccines. Still it happened The Virus happened. Some noted down what they saw, and lived.
I have a particular memory.
A lone abandoned Central Park carriage horse wandering down West 28th Street.
We need to remember such things. This is why there was a call at the start for people to do this. Record all they see. Not for the present, but for history. This below from April 9th 2020. How quickly we forget what happened to us.
“The State of Illinois is trying to obtain 12,000 body bags. Just that…what more to say than that. Me I’ve no intention of dying in the bedlam of an overwhelmed hospital. That or a National Guard field station in Central Park. I’m staying home. I have one serious regret. My mother wanted to die at home. This was not possible given her advanced cancer.
However we should have let her die where she wished. So I’ll die at Home. My Ma had no control over her fate. Tho’ we should have given her that. This time I’m doing it right. I’m kicking the bucket in my digs. With my books my stuff my memories all around me. This is who we are this is how it is."
*...20 months later even I forgot this above post.
Perhaps this is why near all memory of the 1918 Pandemic is gone. Just a faded photo of a cop in a medical mask, and a short paragraph in history books. …if that. It must have been too terrible to want to remember. It’s more complicated this time. Near a third of this country didn’t, and still don’t believe anything happened. They have been so misled by extreme anti-science groups. This with a million bodies at their feet.
If Peter Pan is reading this will you please fucking get me out'a here!
April 5th, 2020
Woke bathed sat. Listened to Dvorak’s “Song to the Moon” on my fav radio station. Found a 15 year old post card from a radio pal congratulating me. This on getting an audience rich time slot. Good timeslots is the currency of live radio performing. Planned dinner,…first things first. Went to market. I stocked up last month. However that’s my reserve for when it gets bad. No it’s not bad yet. A few thousand dead. This is now considered,…not bad.
Went out. More wear masks now. The message months late is getting through. On my block two ambulances. Rainbow lights flashing. Around the corner another. I looked down the parkway. In either direction I counted five more. This at a random time on my few blocks.
The Virus is hitting it’s first peak in the Emerald City. About a thousand a day perishing. Many more trying to get medical help. There will be more like this. Though this isn’t in mainstream media yet. Look on the international online medical sites these are speaking about it.
Few folks at market.
No dairy nor paper goods,…none. Little bread. Meats very marked up. A pack of beef hot dogs is $14. dollars. They said they'd have no more fresh meat next week. The packing plants are mostly infected now. However plenty of canned goods at normal prices. That, and about half of the frozen goods they used to have.
It’s the end of the weekend. I imagine they’ll restock Monday or Tuesday…but will still price gouge. Mayor sez they're cracking down,...right. It getting warmer. 60’s for a few days, but nights still sometimes cold. Trees budding more, and the sky is noticeably bluer. Industries in the region shut down or reduced. Such is the day,…so far. Stay safe.
April 4th, 2020
The Apocalypse in slow motion. Internet works,…even pizza if you can find it. The end gusts through bare trees. A quiet death watch in a Central Park field hospital.
April 2nd 2020.
I walked past a house where the EMT folks were removing a body. The remains were on a wheeled stretcher. This being moved down the walkway, and stairs. Then into the ambulance. People neighbors were watching from their windows. An older woman,…the wife? Stood watching at the top of the stairs. As is required next of kin cannot accompany either the infected nor the deceased. There she was alone in their home. A home of a lifetime decades,…a life together. I’m assuming this. It looked like this.
984 people have perished to the Virus since yesterday in NYC. This one was different. This one I saw. Stay safe stay well stay brave.
March 31, 2020.
The Virus could kill as many as 200,000+ persons in this country. This the best case scenario. One Million…1,000,000 if we stay as we are. Or so real world virologists are saying despite #45.The real butcher’s bill will come out in the middle.
*(...As of Autumn 2021 counting every death including the numbers suppressed in the red states. We're at 1.2 Million perished.)*
This has had an effect on my view of the future. I fear for my family friends myself. This is as real as it can get. Many reading this including myself may not be here a year from now.
*(Six died in my building. 48 on the surrounding blocks so far.)
*(We were in an early hot spot.)
I’m stocking up on Chocolates, and diet Pepsi for the final act if it comes. I may sound un-serious, but what else can I feel as the world ends. Oddly everything but sweets is in short supply.
We are in a culture changing moment, and need to act like it each in our way.
There below the USNHS-Comfort.
She entered the Emerald City harbor this evening. She is very welcome.
The Emerald City is empty. Manhattan is striking. Empty. This at mid-day. Including Times Square. You can see such online. There are plenty of video’s. In fact I didn’t even plan on going into Manhattan. I just stayed on the empty subway till I got there. I had gone to my pharmacy for my diabetes meds re-fill. They’ve stopped deliveries. Instead of going home I stayed on the #3 IRT to Manhattan.
I wanted pizza or hot dogs. It's been so long. Nothing was open. …Nothing. That’s when I decided to walk down the middle traffic line. No cops no cars just some bikes now, and then. Saw a few Army supply trucks, but no real traffic. It looked like those end of the world movies. Think “On the Beach”….art, and life mixing it up.
Things smelled different. It might have been fresh air. As I mentioned in another post. The sky is noticeably bluer. Industry is shutting down,...more stars visible as well.
My social distance was three blocks. Sometimes farther. Literally no foot traffic. Well folks far blocks ahead. That was all. Likely tourists. These dummies I read came here on a cruise ship. Did you know these are still going around the world? Madness. Many ports are now refusing them as they've become plague ships.
Stay safe stay the fuck home.
March 22nd, 2020
So the first thing I see online when I wake up. The Virus took hundreds of souls as we slept. Hundreds more have died in the City since this time yesterday. What is one to do with such knowing. How are we to internalized this? This event is so beyond living with. This, and the suffering in all the world. I witness it before me where I live,…still I can barely believe. It’s heart breakingly insane. ‘But you know this. I only post as a way of bearing witness. Be well be safe be brave be kind.
March 19th, 2020
#45 wants to Quarantine that is blockade New York New Jersey, and southern New England. Odd since he keeps saying the Virus doesn't exist. He would. Shutting the country down will wreck the economy, and he'll lose in November. He'd kill you, and yours to stay president. I just have this thumbnail of info, and even that is rough to read. Blockade of a whole national region. Life has become science fiction. Is the Army going stop all traffic, and people from leaving or entering? The interstate borders are profoundly porous. Anyone can wander in or out. Driving back roads or just walking. This is going to be messy.
March 17, 2020
As I post this on the evening of March 17th 2020. I hear Bells. Saint Marks with her new bells barely two years old in her 120 year old steeple. Saint Gregory’s further down with her 146 year old brass. Bells of Saint Greg’s above. Both chiming as the sun sets.
With a hymn of Bells, and Blessings on the lips of many. That’s Brooklyn or my part of it on this dusk. Be safe be kind be well.
March 12th, 2020
I went out today. This to try to get assorted supplies. Folks about. More behind masks. No traffic. Only a few allowed into shops at a time. That, and most closed altogether. Despite this I felt a calmness today here in the Emerald City. Beneath grey skies a quietness. Life goes on, but with a difference. An awareness. The Earth Abides. You all be well you be safe.
March 10, 2020.
Been watching City-Cams around the world. Italian cities look empty,…like in a sci/fi movie. Seattle the same. Various cities around the world are in various stages of slowing down.
We are witnessing history. A history that is moving faster than we’re used to. For the first time I’m more than concerned. When I went to the Hospital earlier this week. This to get checked up, and renew my meds. I saw things. Whole sections closed off. Bright orange signs saying “Special Procedure Area. No Admittance”. That, and security there.
They’re getting ready.
There’s going to be great sickness, and maybe death here. We know that knew that we all did. It’s was just seeing this that changed things. Made it finally viscerally real. I have the same feeling we all had in the Emerald City when Storm Sandy was inching it’s way here. Apprehension. Will it be as hard as they say or will it just blow past. We have to be ready. Brave cautious, and kind.
February 26th, 2020
I was always a solitary person. However this is very different. This is as the story “The Quiet Earth”. Like so many I have fits of profound sorrow anger boredom confusion, and attempted gluttony. However I know there is no other way. We have to stand down. Maybe,…especially in big cities for a year 18 months maybe more.
This till the vaccines are generally available.
A long road is still ahead. Write down what you see.
Stand fast.
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