Blog One: I shaved today and started to deplete my Salami strategic stockpile: life in the time of Coronavirus. March 16, 2020
My best college class was creative writing where the emphasis was on learning how to write a "declarative sentence.” I graduated Brooklyn Technical High School in 1961 at the age of 16, thanks to the SP program in Junior High School and, due to my lackluster middle school years and a desire to join my father in his Electrical contracting business in Brooklyn, I entered Brooklyn College in what I remember called "the twilight session" where classes started after 3:30 in the afternoon and ran until 10pm. I had nowhere near the grades to get into "regular" Brooklyn College where tuition was about $40 a semester. As I am reading what I write, I must note that my Grandfather, David Lantinberg, The King of The Hot Dog Vendors ( Brooklyn Mirror Article ca. 1928) was the one whose genetic disposition to wandering in thought is in my DNA, perhaps strongly.
For my first paper for that term, the teacher had said please pay attention to your "declarative writing style"; it was about the passing of time. I had just returned from six months of Active Army service, first spent in Ft. Dix NJ in basic training with the rest as a canon-cocker in FT Sill, Lawton OK; yes the MOS was 101 and yes we fired 105 howitzers in the protection of our country. I still feel that as a 18 year old Jewish kid from Brooklyn, the experience of meeting folks in Oklahoma who looked for my horns was a wake-up call and a great learning experience. The counter experience to the Army six month time experience where, every day, you would cross off one more day served, one less day until you were free, was the experience of my grandmother Mary who, right before her 75th birthday, got sick and in a few, time bending days, died. My first, and perhaps only "A" paper.
Speaking with my friend Genie Cohen this morning about the surreal times we find ourselves in, she suggested a blog. I am is self quarantine and have been since last Monday, leaving my home to take one or two walks a day. Angela's daughter Lonnie had contacted us 8 weeks ago predicting, with perfect accuracy, everything that has come to pass. When she told Angela she was ordering 25 pound bags of lintels, I shrugged and said "that's nice." When, two or three days after another Lonnie note, we started to see reported exactly what she had written a few days earlier, when the body count started to rise, we started going to Costco to stock up, stopped going out to eat and started to disinfect everything coming into the house. A week ago Monday I wrote the Boca Art school that as a 75 year old with underlying health issues, I would not be teaching the rest of the new term. The school, of course, has now cancelled all classes. I am not going anywhere right now.
So. Today I shaved. (Or) I shaved today; I think my English teacher would be proud that after 57 years I remember! Staying at home last week was pretty much a waste of time. Talking with Genie this morning, we both expressed the feelings that we have had great lives, wonderful times and, looking back, have no regrets. I truly feel we have no idea as to what the next few weeks, let alone tomorrow, may bring. I am calm and feel at peace, perhaps a strange emotion in this time of craziness. So I looked in the mirror, said to myself, time to shave. So today I shaved.
Please be safe, be smart, be kind to all. Hopefully tomorrow I will still be around and will let you know about my strategic reserve of Salami and today's assault on same! Sending love to all, Lew