The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 67

DAY 67: Or, let's play another game

it's a math game too, I know you

like math, who doesn't? The percentage

game: 50% 10% 95% and so on

like if there were a 50% chance of dying

would you do it? what? doesn't

matter, I'm explaining the game.

Go back to your job but there's

a 10% chance of getting the virus

would you? with a 5% chance

of dying? would you send your

kids to school with a 75% chance

they'd be infected, hospitalized

possibly cremated before you could

even say goodbye, no last "I love you, kid"?

-- that seems a bit high

-- oh, it's wrong, it's 7.5%, is that okay now?

-- better

-- would you change your answer?

where's the cut off, the cap

where's the curve go down, up

round the bend, loop-the-loop, what 
about that little number 1%?

1% infected, sick, some dead

is that acceptable?

that's 3.4 million Americans

you know, you will know a lot

of them, if you're not one --

Hey, TV Doctor Strange, is that 

a tolerable percentage?

I know some other doctors, real ones

who are giving 110%

and they'd be in that number

when the saints go ...

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 66

DAY 66: I said to someone yesterday

just because the authorities say you

can go out doesn't mean

you have to and they looked at me

like I had lost my f-ing mind

they said, "have you lost your f-ing

mind?" As soon as the ribbon drops

the marathon begins and we all,

free for all, run in all directions

free finally to play on the fourth day

of May or the seventh or eleventh

-- read the authorization ordinance

for more details -- we're opening the bars

under the stars

everyone rush out to reinfect

redirect your germ effect

on a curve, a slope, a spike

your life, on a graph, look at that,

more death, or less, I guess, it's safe

to leave the home place, run
run to meet your fate
run your fate to meet

through fields of wildflowers

even with bad allergies
and bad feet.

Worth it. Deny the truth --

we stayed in, it worked

stay in more, work more

go out, bad idea, could bring in

the hearse -- in any case,

I say this, mate -- you go first.

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 65

DAY 65: Let's play a game

lots of game-playing these days

this is a math game

X is to Y, it's called

what would you give up for what

question mark

like in Lent or New Year's or Ramadan

or fasting or any self-deprivation

give up something to get something

okay, ready?

Would you give up chewing gum

to save your teeth? Don't answer

sugarless gum, you don't get to

wriggle out, A for B, yes or no?

Would you give up smoking

to live ten years longer guaranteed?

Yes or no, would you give up air travel

to save the Earth from climate-change?

Get it? It gets progressively

harder to say 'yes'. Another --

would you wear mask and gloves

whenever you go out to save your

kids' lives? Too much to ask?

Would you stay indoors for a

solid year to save the lives of every

doctor and nurse in your country?

Will they really die if I say 'no'? You know

my business will fail ...

I will not have funds to bet

on horse-races anymore, and

I might live in the tent-city I've

only driven by in my Lexus ...

What would you sacrifice? to

save your own skin, naked and afraid

alone and hurt, shame without end

alive or dead -- no game.

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 64

DAY 64: Oh man, you're morbid,

Get out of the graveyard!

No. I need to dwell, to dwell

in the graveyard for now

I need to be where the trucks full

of coffins are, be there

so you remember, here's the scene:

you're Christopher Walken

and I'm Robert De Niro

or vice versa, I don't care,

and you spin the pistol on

the table, there's money there

you smell blood and sweat

so strong you're not thinking

straight, then it's your turn

you chances are okay: 5 to 1

I don't think you can walk away

maybe you could have earlier

but now you're in it, committed

-- they've opened 8 states

opened the schools and bowling

alleys, fast food and tattoos

the holiness churches and

polling stations, meat-packing

plants and video-game parlors

not to mention brothels and

crack-houses, and the filthy

warehouse where men gather

to bet on death and laugh --

and this, it's okay, your chances

are 5 to 1, or so -- CUT!

change casting, send in the 

stunt doubles, put 2 Republican

governors at the table, or the

President and his favorite daughter

-- rolling, annnnd ACTION!

Is there no other way out?

I think there is.

Nobody's forcing us to leave
"the safety of our homes."

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 63

DAY 63: A year of magical thinking

and happy talk --

I CAN'T TAKE IT ANY MORE!

it's almost over, we'll be okay

the human sacrifice

has been made, the price to pay

magical thinking and happy talk

let's reopen our mouths

and let it all come crashing out

the criticism, the hate, come crashing in

you say, it's reckless

unconscionable?

but, listen, we CAN'T! TAKE! IT! ANY! MORE!

so we're gonna force back

normality, open the bars

like after prohibition

what a celebration!

let's get livin'

jivin' an' divin', high-fivin'

somebody's gonna die

but it won't be me 'cause

I have my magical thinking

and happy talk TV

happy talk reality

we're finally inside

a world of reality TV

we live next to the Bradys

with Truman and Trump

an eternal blue sky

and a required mass suicide

     got to keep the customer satisfied

     so satisfied.

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 62

DAY 62: Vietnam was my Vietnam.

Not HIV/AIDS or the more recent

pointless wars, I grew up with

nightmares about Vietnam, it

consumed my teen years, it was

the monster in my closet, the

huge black shadow over the boy

-- today, in 2 months, in the U.S.

(the Vietnam killer) the number

of dead from the horrible virus

surpassed the 58,000 of a 10-year

war -- my God, my God!

If Vietnam changed my whole

life -- the protests, marches

loneliness (of being anti- in a pro- 

town), the fear (of my 2-years in 

prison, expected but not accepted)

if I'm still scarred 50 years

later like all men my age who

went or didn't, then what will

happen inside this generation
of the covid-war, the climate-war

the scarred for life who might

still live in 2100? 

What part of the soul is their Vietnam 
War? that place burnt with a white-

hot iron, cauterized but unbear-

ably painful, hypertrophic scar tissue 

never to be soft again -- a 60-day 

Vietnam -- the horror,

the indescribable horror.

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 61

DAY 61: Are we learning yet?

What really matters

does your hair matter

does your car matter

does reconnecting with old high

school friends matter?

does art, reading, movies, music

does healing, hospitals, health

are we learning yet?

what are those rich bastards

doing with all that public money

they're cheating out of us

while so many suffer

like they want to highlight

that they're cleaning up during

the plague -- over here look

at pathetic infantile black soul

million-dollar me, building my big

pile in the face of you can't take 

it with you -- you don't matter

you don't exist, I'm trying to

stay alive, I'm trying to stay

sane and prosper, thrive

in a pandemic -- yes, not 

merely survive but grow, change

reach some maturity big enough

to take this all in, to understand

the shaky ground under my feet, right 

now -- two naked people in the

garden eating fruit

and then all this.

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 60

DAY 60: You're throwing numbers at me

I don't trust your numbers, I do not

believe, I think you're bending them

to get your desired equation, if

the numbers tell us to party, we

must party, unless you believe

the books are cooked, the dead

unaccounted for, the sick underestimated

the recurrence certainty ignored

-- it really is money über alles

we're really factoring in numbers

of people who will die

for the Dow, to open the bars

for the private beaches -- hell,

summer is coming fast!

profits are down, those numbers

unemployment up, deficit

spending funny money a

government simply prints

-- but the scientists told us

what digits count, how to count

who counts, two plus two

a two-week down curve min-

imum before reopening -- seven

states said screw that we're

opening now, get a head start

on the second wave -- look

around, it's not working in

other places -- can we not

behave appropriately?

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 59

DAY 59: Call my country Dis-

appointment, call my country

Shame, the United States of Shame

to blame, we can pin all our

troubles on the government and

its supporters, run the scapegoat

out of the village -- easy, but

not that easy, the system doesn't work

didn't work, isn't working

people praise the brave, praise

the self-sacrificing heroes

working in deprived conditions

people call for a new public

health system like in Europe

yeah, yeah, then I could go home

but no, no, I can't go home again
the whole house of cards 
collapsed, the mighty mighty

U.S.A. is a failed superpower

you failed, too big to fail?
too big to succeed
a tottering giant brought 
down by a germ
 -- shame in aeternum

you couldn't get your act

together and still can't, why

not? no time for queries, fact:

you failed, everyone, everywhere

-- yes some intentionally,

some are friends with the apoc-

alypse -- but all failed and

people died for nothing --

for nothing, they died when

they didn't need to, they should

not have died, they're still dying
and this reopening is absurd
Absurd America:
 -- get your shit together!

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 58

DAY 58: Grandpa, back in the COVID

plague of 2020, what did you do

all day? You had about 100 days

cloistered at home, with almost no

distractions or responsibilities, 
did you invent things

or come up with grand ideas 
to save us all? 

Well, let's see if I can 
remember ... we watched TV

a lot, that I remember, hours and 

hours, the news obsessively and

all those terrible shows they

used to make.
What else?

Not that much, we ate too much,

lots of sugar and salt snacks

and mostly sat on couches in

our pajamas.
You couldn't go out to eat,

so what foods did you miss?

Fast food. -- Oh, yuck.

I don't get it, you had a

unique opportunity, 100 free days

help yourself, help someone else
couldn't you do something better?

I guess we were scared and confused 

and weak, we waited and hoped

we wouldn't be the next to die.

What about living?
Sometimes we tried, but everyone was 
bored and depressed, "too depressed

to get dressed" we said, so not

much happened until we could

finally go outside again.
You mean before the second wave?
Yeah, the giant tsunami.
But didn't you know that that 

would happen? It was so obvious!
Sure, we knew, and

went out anyway.

[Now, make a movie about that
I dare you.]

The Quarantine Chronicles, Day 57

DAY 57: Who's dying?

They're dying

or we're dying?

We are

you are us, we are you

old and sick -- or not,

160 doctors of medicine

in Italy up to today --

say their names out loud* --

we die with you

alone and afraid

we mourn with your families

we can't breathe

in the 'us' and 'them' of some

perverted religion: we

righteous, you damned,

that became international politics

blue / red -- all blood -- vein / artery

all the same

no 'them', no 'other', all us

we, We the people, WE. THE. PEOPLE.

same blood coming and going, same

breath, same death,

for all, rich and poor, the

1% die 1% of the time, we

99, we're losing ourselves

fast, so fast we can't fill out the forms --

remember any one loved one gone

that gut punch, head spin --

how can we expect ourselves

to repeat that shock for

5, 5000, 50000?

only by being part of the whole

organism, that's losing precious cells,

can we get it all, as we dying

we, all around the world

and it hurts.

*see list in comments