This year

I have zero cause for complaint. I'm extremely superstitious about mentioning this, but my loved ones are safe and healthy.

But here I go: this is the year in which a predicted snowstorm is likely to cancel Isaac and Edna's scheduled COVID-19 test tomorrow. They also have a test today, but they will have to wait longer for its results, and they're waiting in a generously donated—but very cold—space. This is the year that is keeping most of my beloveds, including my sweetest girl, far away.

Lucky: to have a kid who could drive here, to have a friend who would offer his empty house for isolating. To have enough money to feed ourselves and also buy out the frozen section of Trader Joe's for said kid's quarantine. To have a warm puppy and a warm catfriend and lights on a perfect little tree and batteries for window candles and a tube of almond paste for macaroons in the meantime. To have a car WITH HEATED SEATS and a beach ten minutes away, to walk in the cold wrapped in a warm coat. 

Things I observed recently:

• Crows congregating in a circle, something happening in the middle, but what? 
• A man wearing bright yellow trousers smoking a pipe over his lowered mask. 
• A sweet pit bull in a sweater gazing up earnestly at me, a loving, begging face. 
• Clover at a loss, looking like she forgot something, searching for Mark across the beach, on a day we'd gone without him.
• A police car running a red light, no lights or sirens on, just coasting slowly, brazenly through it.
• One lone bird trapped inside Trader Joe's (I keep thinking and worrying about this bird, days later).