January began with my daughter Daphne and me making plans for my 70th birthday in July. Neither of us had been to Amsterdam and we thought it would be fun. Summer would be a perfect time for a mother-daughter trip, what with my grandchildren Jack, then, 8 scheduled to be at sleep-away camp and Lucy, then 5, scheduled to be at a variety of day camps near their home in the San Francisco Bay Area. Who knew that within less than two months, all those plans would have to be cancelled because of Covid-19.
February proved magical. Over Labor Day weekend 2019, I had planned a Club Med trip to Ixtapa for February vacation with Daphne and her family. The adults loved not having to be responsible for meals, and the kids loved being able to enjoy gelato any time they wanted it. The only real choice involved enjoying the warmth of the sun poolside or a glorious beach. The staff was lovely and didn’t seem to mind when I occupied a table for 6 on the terrace overlooking the Pacific, knowing the kids might not show up for a good half hour or 45 minutes.
By the end of February, my family and I were terrified of catching Covid-19. Daphne ordered me not to participate in a spinning class I took each week at my gym. Before long the gym had to shut down. I began running up and down the stairs in my condo complex for exercise when I wasn’t doing planks or lifting weights in my den. At the insistence of my daughter, I told my cleaning people I would pay them, but not to come.
I was hoarding toilet paper, paper towel, Chlorox spray cleaner, which I bought online, plus isopropyl alcohol. The latter was the result of my telling the manager that because CVS had screwed up my husband’s prescriptions and caused me to make a super inconvenient trip back to the store, the least he could do was sell me extra bottles of isopropyl.
In March, my son-in-law started a new job, but never even got to step foot on the magnificent campus the company occupied in California. Can you imagine starting a new job remotely? Or having to work in a house that was impossibly cramped with 2 adults working at home, and 2 children doing “remote learning.” Etan was forced to use the garage as a home office, not unheard of in the San Francisco Bay Area. He sat at his computer and participated in Zoom calls, surrounded by bicycles, suitcases, and beach toys, the result of that garage having been a storage area pre Covid.
Come April, I occupied myself with online shopping, a Covid-19 activity that continues to this day. Prana kept having wonderful sales and I got good deals on pants and knickers. Where was I going that I would need the Boden striped tops I was ordering, also at good prices.
After cleaning my condo twice – trust me, it wasn’t fun -- I invited the cleaning people to return, provided they wore masks. We could not have been happier to see each other.
Come May and June, good stuff happened. Thanks to volunteers who are as caring as they are smart and talented, Cambridge Boat Club opened for rowing in single shells – with mandatory outdoor hand washing – and no access to the boat house until late summer, a small sacrifice. There were a lot of necessary rules to minimize contagion, and we all stayed healthy as we got out on the water, pretty much as often as we wanted. Eventually we could enter the boathouse.
With the reopening of my gym, I was delighted to resume weight training with all the equipment I needed. Sadly my gym, which has always had a reputation for cleanliness, is still a ghost town. There’s even talk that the building in which my gym is housed could eventually host a marijuana dispensary. Ugh!
By late summer, wild fires, coupled with extremely hot weather, made life miserable enough for Etan and Daphne to contemplate relocating to Philadelphia -- close to his family. He took one house hunting trip before suggesting that the whole family come East where they could stay with his brother and sister-in-law, and the kids could have the time of their lives, playing with their cousins.
Come the end of September, the kids decided to rent a big old house on the Main Line. Hopefully there will be more homes on the market when Covid is brought under control in 2021, and they will find something to purchase. Jack got to visit me in Boston, and I got to stay with Jack and Lucy at their new home while their parents took care of moving.
First things first! Daphne and Etan got to Pennsylvania in time to register and vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. I knew their votes would mean more in PA than CA. Jack and Lucy started in person school, albeit in a hybrid program, and they loved that. Alas, Covid has caused intermittent school closures, even after the hybrid program was adopted.
November was a real nail biter for me and others who couldn’t live with the idea of having a monster with no regard for the Constitution or human rights at the helm of the United States government. You can imagine how my husband and I felt the day after Election Day. But by the end of the week, Biden had been declared the winner and we felt joyful.
Now that 2020 is wrapping up, I wish I could tell you that I have firm travel plans for after the Covid lockdowns are lifted, and all of us can get vaccinated. I’m thinking of Corfu, Greece for late September, and maybe Mexico for January.
Actually, I’m hoping my first trip post Covid will be to visit Jack and Lucy.
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