⌚️ Flashback Friday: March 26th, 2023
"Requiem for a Pandemic: Stella Blue" An essay from the archives. Available to all subscribers.
Four years ago on this day on March 15th, 2020, the New York City School System closed and America began its COVID shutdown at scale. Living in Brooklyn and married to a nurse serving in the thick of it, I would have found it unimaginable that the crisis we collectively experienced would ever be forgotten. Or — even more unimaginable — that the pandemic would be remembered as a battlefield and not as a graveyard.
For shame.
Last year in the essay “Requiem for the Pandemic: Stella Blue” I examined my distress that I was already forgetting the essential and tragic. I considered the memories I wanted to preserve — and honor — about the horror of those early months.
I was already feeling the foreboding chill with the first sentence. This.
The whole piece. Should be in every major newspaper across the country. We all have our own stories. Some, encased in tears.
I could quote all of it, right back to you. Each paragraph carrying an overwhelming amount of weight. The raw beauty of words.
“…I still need my scars to shine. “
“…like a picture where you don't know what you're looking at and then you do and then you can’t unsee it.”
The juxtaposition of your mind’s eye, experiencing the preview, present and fallout ,of your wife’s fall. And then back to the pandemic. Is brilliant.
“Sunday family safari park ride…”
“… rows and rows of white refrigerator tractor trailers…”
I am still burning.
We need the reminding. I do not want to forget any of it.
(I think you might have missed this . )
J.E. Peterson is correct. I do feel it is a privilege to be able to respond to a writer. How many times through your reading life had you closed the cover on an incredible novel you had just finished and wished you could just let the author know what you feel at that given moment. The answer is none, because we can’t. For me, it is one of the best parts of Substack.
Especially when I read an exceptional piece. Like this one.
It stirs within me , and I personally feel the need to take the time to tell you so. Because I can. Truthfully, I don’t understand. Some authors, such as yourself, who excel way beyond the collective group of authors on this venue, do not have a large number of readers. You must realize when scrolling around, that those with ‘many’ can sometimes have no talent at all. Well, thats my perspective from a non-writer point of view. Posting a very personal piece is a testament to a great writer.
I know it is safe to say that the quality of work is not at all measured by the quantity of subscribers. Unless you are trying to earn a living, consider Substack a ‘playground’ to continue to do what you love. Write great pieces, for yourself and anyone out there who ‘gets it’. Last, because I know you love music as much as I do, I will leave you with part of an interview from
Pat Metheny. He is at the top of my list of all time favorites.
PM:
“Honestly, I don’t worry too much about peoples perception, because it is something that I have no control over, and truth be told, very little interest in. I really just try to play the music that I love and that I feel strongly about. If I were to start worrying now about what I thought someone else likes, first of all I would be guessing, because I simply don’t know. Also, whatever success I have had has been really built on just following my own musical instincts and by reacting to the things that I found to be true in music itself.”
( Feel free to substitute the word music, with writing). Also feel free to delete this post when you’ve finished. It is just for you after all.