At the Edge of the Pandemic

February feels like almost a lifetime ago.

I stood on the shore of Baker Beach on Friday, February 21st, Golden Gate Bridge in the distance, feeling the frozen water on my feet, the bay breeze whipping through my hair. Sophie and Rob sprinted ahead of me while I looked beyond them at my friend Andy, who was visiting us in California for the first time.

He had arrived late on a Wednesday and I picked him up at the airport and stopped, as you do, at In N Out for late night Double Doubles. I was teaching five classes a week at Pure Barre so I got my Thursday morning covered and Rob dropped Sophie off at school (a routine that all three of us were enjoying, but especially Sophie) and Andy and I lazily drank lattes on my couch as Ender excitedly slobbered all over him. Around lunchtime we picked Sophie up at school and ordered too many dumplings before heading back to put her down for a nap and drink afternoon Negronis in our backyard, under the gazebo. Rob came home from the office early and we ordered pizza.

It was the perfect slow down from what had been a busy start to the year, and the weather was perfect—exactly what I had hoped for my friend who was escaping Baltimore in February for a sunny long weekend in California.

Ahead of us was a year of work and travel that we had been planning for and looking forward to for months: weddings in Sonoma and Ohio, a big family trip to Lake Tahoe, a small family getaway to Hawaii, and then the countless days and weekends with no real plans in a place that was finally starting to feel like home.

We headed back to the Mission for coffee and to walk around, finally hugging Andy goodbye as we left him on the sidewalk with another friend who lived in the city. His visit to California was overlapping a trip to New York we had planned, so we headed home to pack and eat leftovers and drop the dog off at the kennel.

We flew to New York the following day with plans to spend two weeks on the east coast, leaving New York over the weekend to visit two sets of friends in the Boston area, and then dropping Rob back in the city for work as Sophie and I headed down to Virginia to connect with family and friends for a few days. I had no idea it would be the last time I would see anyone for almost half a year.

We hugged friends and shared food and touched doorknobs without immediately washing our hands. Sophie scaled several playgrounds in Central Park, launching possibly virus-covered balls as high as possible overhead. At the Math Museum she picked up unsanitized blocks and magnets. When she woke up with a high fever on our second day in the city, I didn’t even think twice about it, I just bundled up and walked to the CVS on the corner for a thermometer, some Advil, and an apple juice. We spent the day together in bed, watching Little Baby Bum, drinking juice (her) and coffee (me), ordering room service, and reading (me) and napping (her).

It wasn’t really until halfway through the trip that we started to hear and read uncertain murmurs about the novel coronavirus making its way to the United States. At my friend Jenna’s house, I remember saying “I think I’d just feel better if I had some hand sanitizer,” as though that one small thing was the solution to a soon-to-be pandemic. She handed me a green travel-size bottle, and I really did feel better.

I have endured this pandemic with very little loss and still it has changed my life, maybe forever. Looking back, it’s bizarre to know that we were just teetering there, on the precipice of something truly monumental.

But we can only go forward from here.