of Juliet, the Magazine Volume 4 Issue 1 by ofJuliet

b a s e l i n e : n o t o k ay

of Juliet, the Magazine

v 4 issu e

Contents Editor’s Letter Sam Mangino 7 Letters of Rec Ariel Knoebel 11

Dispatches Max Cohen 31

Dispatch Joshua Lewin 13

Sue of Dogpatch Ariel Knoebel 35

Local Correspondents Nora Connolly 19

How the Hell Am I Supposed to Cook Right Now Maya Kaczor 39

If I’m Your Nurse Alex Butler 23 Enough Zucchini for a Small Family Natalie Gale 25 Autonomy Tom Fogg 27

Melt Gracie Griffin 43 How to Paint a Rock a Day Karin Hoelzl 47 Katie’s Corner: Pandemic Parenting Katie Rosengren 49

Home of Somerville’s Most Unique Dining Experience as well as Juliet Café Living Wages Great food. Great jobs. Great company.

of Juliet, the Magazine is: a little piece of something bigger, of Juliet Mediaverse not a food magazine, not really presented by Prospect Tower observation in association with Juliet + Company Editor-in-Chief Sam Mangino Managing Editor Katie Rosengren Editor-at-Large Joshua Lewin Design & Layout Maddie Trainor Artwork by Ebbi Boehm Contributors Ariel Knoebel Joshua Lewin Nora Connolly Alex Butler Natalie Gale Tom Fogg Max Cohen Maya Kaczor Gracie Griffin Karin Hoelzl Katie Rosengren

Contributors ARIEL KNOEBEL is a writer, food historian, and sometimes illustrator when she is not helping lead the front of house team at Juliet. In her time off, she is likely wandering in the woods with a hot beverage in hand and her dog Whiskey underfoot, or cooking and watching bad TV with friends. She was raised to never leave the house without a book, and is always open to recommendations. For more of her work, visit sipandspoonful.com. SAM MANGINO is a writer thirdgeneration restaurant professional. She takes her martinis with gin and olives, and her chips with extra dip. She has a complicated relationship with tomatoes. You will often find her on the internet. Other times she can be spotted around the Cambridge-Somerville area almost always listening to NPR. KATIE ROSENGREN is the Operations Director of Juliet + Company, a job which combines two of her favorite things, making spreadsheets and eating food. After a decade plus detour in New York, Katie and her husband, Cole, - both native Mainers- are happy to be back in New England and call Somerville home with their son, Henry. She is a playground aficionado, lover of tv, and unapologetic feminist.

NORA CONNOLLY is a server and enthusiastic lemonade-maker at Juliet. She is the author of Celeste Gets an Answer, a children’s book about a curious snail, as well as a prolific walker, talker, reader, and swimmer. NATALIE GALE is a Boston-based writer and editor. When she’s not covering art, culture, or travel for various publications, you can find her baking mediocre pastries and getting too much sun on her face. Except on rainy days, when she reads three books at a time and decides what color she’ll dye her hair next. GRACIE GRIFFIN is a writer and storyteller who thinks that the magic of language lies in its immense power to bring people together. A recent graduate of Smith College, she is currently working on writing for joy (and perhaps sometimes a paycheck) and using her creative work to navigate the startling mundanity of early adulthood. By day, she works at a Cambridgebased scientific publishing company, and by night, she drinks tea, eats microwave popcorn, and endlessly rewatches the same five shows on Netflix.

TOM FOGG has never actually written anything until the pandemic killed his career in London restaurants in 2020. Thanks to a psychotic episode in his youth, Tom’s deep interest in the hidden machinations of the human mind inform his writing and guide his work as a personal development coach. A lover of vintage shotguns, philosophy and West Indies cricket from the 1980’s, Tom now lives with his thoughts in a rat run village in a county called Kent in the South East of the UK. KARIN HOELZL is an artist currently biding her time in DC while she waits to return to London! In addition to rock painting she acts, writes, and never stops talking. She’d like to thank Sam, her best friend, for opening the doors to Juliet and being the best of all time ever. Huzzah! JOSHUA LEWIN is a career cook, who currently spends most of his time doing anything but that. ALEX BUTLER is a nurse in the Trauma/Oncology Operating Rooms at Massachusetts General Hospital, as well as a published poet and writer. His recent works can be found in McSweeney’s, Fictive Magazine, and the ANA Mass Nursing Newsletter. He lives with his wife in Somerville, where they love to cook together.

MAXWELL COHEN is a writer of short stories, the blog collection Dispatches from the Roof, and the full-length novel Bananas!, which you can read online, for free, right now, at www.bananasnovel.com. Max is always happy to engage, so contact him at arcadiocreative@gmail.com, if you have any questions, comments, backhanded compliments, or job opportunities.” MAYA KAZCOR is a PolishAmerican writer from New Jersey. She works in book publishing from 9-5 and spends the rest of her time baking or on the internet. You can find pictures of her food, her pets, and her big head on instagram @mayakaze. EBBI BOEHM is an architecture student, illustrator of impossible places, and the designated sushi chef of their family and friends. For more of their work, contact ebbi.boehm@ gmail.com

Editor’s Note sa m m a ngino

For this upcoming issue, I started to draft an essay entitled We Need To Stop Crying Over This Cat that I thought would be a long winded extended metaphor about my girlfriend’s very large cat she adopted during the pandemic and how his presence in our lives could sum up everything we’ve experienced together in pandemic life. Maybe one day I’ll finish it, but I tossed it out because my world once again stopped this week. On a Friday at 1:59 pm, I was notified that I’d been in close contact with someone who tested positive for COVID. Just like that my life had to stop. I had to make a series of calls notifying my workplace and loved ones of the situation. I assessed my kitchen for any emergency groceries I might need to order online for delivery. I pulled a puzzle out of the closet to entertain myself. And I put on the closest pair of sweatpants I could find. It was a song and dance that I started almost a year ago to the day. It was like having an anniversary party for when the world around us shut down.

I’ve been incredibly fortunate this year. Despite traveling to London and then being in and out of hospitals for an injury in early March of 2020, I haven’t had a COVID scare until year two of the pandemic. No contact tracing calls. All my COVID tests have always come back negative. The sudden sore throat and cough have always just boiled down to allergies. A few weeks ago, I was sliding into homebase of surviving this year; I received my first dose of the Moderna vaccine. But none of us are really safe. No matter what precautions we take, we can find ourselves suddenly quarantined for 7 days, alone in our homes, hoping that a lot of screen time, some deep breathing, and maybe a few bottles of wine will help us pass the time. This is not a future I was prepared for. While I thought by April of 2021, I’d be visiting my friends who are dispersed throughout the globe, I’m still at home, wearing masks when going out in public, and getting daily notifications about the still thousands of daily cases being announced in my state. 5

I thought when I started my first editor’s letter that I’d be able to produce some eloquent reflection on this past year. But in the quarantine I’m now writing you from, I feel defeated in doing so. However, what I can offer you instead lives on the pages of this magazine. The contributors have written some of the most potent and touching words that I’ve been revisiting leading up to publication as reminders of hope and the restorative nature of writing. I’m so grateful that our writers chose to send of Juliet, the Magazine their thoughtful work. And I certainly would not be able to edit without our managing editor, Katie Rosengren, keeping my commas (and deadlines) in place. Thank you, Josh for passing on the torch of oJ to me this year. No matter what the world continues to shape into this year, I hope that we will continue to share some words; that whether or not we really are, make us feel a little bit more ok.

Keep Moving Forward a r iel k noebel

Several years ago, I got into distance running. I trained for a marathon, spending hours striking feet on pavement, tracking miles, working on gaining speed and distance week over week. I like hard work. I like to have a goal. I am not a natural runner, by any means, but I loved the rhythmic feel of many miles at a slow (too slow, always) but steady pace. I loved the way my brain seemed to soften, slow down, quiet, in order to focus on sustaining motion. The initial adrenaline rush would fade and every part of my body would begin to work in sync, feeling for what muscles were fatigued, which could take on a little bit more while they rested, where tension was pulling energy that could be better used on the goal — continuous forward motion. That was it. Simple. This time of year always makes me itch for my running shoes again. The sunny days sprinkled throughout early March send me outside, lungs burning and knees aching as I retrain my body for a new type of movement, long forgotten through the icy-sidewalked winter, left behind in the brisk winds of fall. Last year at this time, there was no opportunity to speed up. We were forced to hit pause. We were being told not to leave the house – even for just a run. But, I have a dog; and no matter what, he needs to be walked. So I walked. For hours on end, through familiar neighborhoods and new, to the park, to the cracked window of the only open coffee shop nearby, wondering at the new buds of spring and the way the morning light shifted with the seasons. At least once, sometimes two or three times a day, I’d set off in one direction until I found myself looping around back home, no end in mind, no goal in sight. No job to do, no purpose. Just forward motion. Here we are, a year later, and the world is yawning awake again. The sun is shining more days than not, the light fades slower each night. We’ve learned to live, a little bit, with the veil of disease over us — and we’re starting to see a world in which that veil may be lifted. Things almost feel normal a lot of days. But, I still walk. A lot. And I encourage you to do so as well. Resist the world speeding back up by moving slow. Maintain a steady pace, but don’t rush. Look around. Look up. The sky has changed colors today, It’s surprisingly blue. Notice the bird’s nest in the corner of the building you pass each morning, as if it appeared overnight. It did not, but you were looking down the last few days, probably at your phone. Try to avoid that. Walk that same way each morning for a week, watch that bird’s nest grow. Learn to appreciate the beauty of pigeons by seeing them parent. They gain such dignity through that role. If you must look down, keep your phone in your pocket and just look. Find faded graffiti, lost gloves, baby socks left abandoned by cold toes wheeled away 9

in a stroller or kicked off restless feet in big sister’s clumsy carry. Write stories in your head about these lost objects, picture the teenaged taggers sneaking through the night, dressed in all black, to wheatpaste that hot pink coyote to the mailbox. Step back and ponder it like art in a museum. Walk alone. Walk with your thoughts, moving forward keeps them in motion too, use the momentum of your steps to untangle what’s stuck and allow it to flow. Walk without thoughts. Empty your mind and take in the world slowly, a few feet at a time. Sometimes loud music helps, maybe something nostalgic, something that reminds you of car windows rolled down. Sometimes it’s best with no music at all, especially if you’re walking through fresh-fallen snow. Listen to the world with the volume turned all the way down. Walk in any weather. In the summer, carry a towel and a book to spread on the grass and bask in the sunshine, escape into another world for a moment. In the winter, walk through sunny days and snowstorms. Try not to hunch over too much, it’s bad for your shoulders to cave in like that. Bundle up and stand tall. And carry a warm beverage, that is the key to a winter walk, I think. Walk with a friend. A warm beverage is nice for this too. Or a cold one in the summer, maybe even a cocktail. Lose track of time and distance, and sit on a park bench and get into one of those conversations that you wish you could record, but no one else would understand it. It’s like a piece of modern art made for just the two of you. Laugh really hard. Tell each other you wish you could hug. Mean it. Walk up a mountain, if you can get to one. Stand on top and feel how small you are. See how big the world is. Take a deep breath. Feel your brain soften, slow down, quiet. Feel where you’re fatigued, where you are holding tension that could be better used to sustain forward motion. There’s no need to have any more of a goal than that. You just can’t stop, not now. Not for a long while yet. Keep moving, at whatever pace. Go slow. Take notice. Keep your head up, your eyes open. That’s it. Simple.

Dispatch Legacy joshua lewin

poisoned minds with effects that linger a million have died millions more lost below Greece 400 miles of barrier were built 666 children remain unknown Trump rules Supreme! female, Black: 100% not qualified America: Deep Swamp dirty, sick, mean, dead delusional power lastingly destructive statements super-spread radioactive dust [lie routinely, about everything: war, sex, health] corrosive effect on democracy Tricky Dick recovered their trust cover up sandal; make disaster disappear mislead in service: Jimmy Carter? sent him back to Georgia! gauzy fictions were popular Trump belonged to reality itself! breathe his air; the very truth and purpose never disloyal underlings desire enforcement: hurt enemies / extort women intentionally demolish honesty and strength without apology: gaping shame barrage of falsehoods fevered months unconcealed brutality

more brazen and more better conspiracy activated entitled children: the establishment fell in line stab in the minds millions burn; perish a different universe; locked reality power to destroy profoundly abandon the field to fantasists believers surrendered the ability; swirling in the wind potent and thrilling truth: evil summon energy and truth escape reality seek refuge in a pattern not a fascist change hostility: Enlightenment ideal process: empowered identity deserve it clear minds of lies; restore reality chance broke the spell of sinister perversion! Americans died needlessly and flailed between fantasy and negligence the essence of power belongs universally to the people before dawn despite the soaring threat.

Local Correspondents nor a connolly

I texted B. a picture I took while I was walking downtown the other night, of the window display of a market. “I’m Jimmy Stewart in the flower shop in Vertigo,” I said. “You must be in a pretty cool headspace rn if that’s what you’re seeing,” he replied. *** Sometimes you wake up and you think, “now I will make the coffee.” Sometimes you wake up and all you can see is the light moving around your bottle collection. That’s when you know you’ve entered the cool headspace, and that’s a day when coincidences will strike. I tell myself that the coincidences only happen because I’m looking for them, but I don’t really buy it. *** I’m supposed to use this space to report on what I overhear, but there isn’t much to overhear these days. I could write down what my coworkers say, but I don’t want them to stop talking around me for fear of being rendered immortal. As soon as the problem occurs to me, I start finding the postcards: one tucked into a novel borrowed from the library, one in a used bookstore in Hadley, and one in a box of paperbacks on a curb. A new way of overhearing, from a distance. *** I’d been thinking about what makes a good piece of communication. On the phone with C., I asked him to describe his ideal message. “It would always start with an apology,” he said. “Then an inside joke. Then an update on the person’s life, with a few trenchant anecdotes and details.” “What if there’s nothing to apologize for?” I asked. “There’s always something to apologize for,” he said. I have to say, I found that strange. Should I be apologizing to C. more? *** 17

Found in “The Comforters,” by Muriel Spark, borrowed from the Concord Free Public Library. 1/14/21. To Mr. and Mrs. Martin T—?, 505 D— Street, Alexandria, VA. 1966.

“Greetings! Feeling human again. Regret short lived. Indian summer here. Best! Joe.” *** When you only hear snippets of a story, everything is freighted and intriguing. Joe seems to have known that. ***

Found in “Martian Dawn,” by Michael Friedman, at Grey Matter Books in Hadley, MA. 2/3/21, C’s birthday. 18

To Gerrit Lansing, 292 Western Avenue, Gloucester, MA. Ides of March, 1991. “Gerrit — it really looks like this RIGHT NOW—Today received your card & today climbed and hiked 8 miles into Sabino Canyon, giant saguaro cactus, rocks, ponds, rivulets, et alii. See you soon. J—.” “Hi Gerrit. Pls heal this boy!! Come visit? TW.” *** This is a strong communication for its use of “et alii,” rarely seen outside of the crossword, and its recognition that Arizona “really looks like this.” I have seen saguaro cactuses, and that is the only appropriate reaction to them. This postcard becomes an eavesdropper’s delight with the addendum from TW, a postscriptual twist of the knife. PS. My ideal message will always include a little drawing. ***

Found in “Lives of the Saints,” by Nancy Lemann, in a box of books on Inman Street, in front of the same house where I found those boots in my exact size. Cambridge, MA. 3/1/21. 19

To S. Smitty, 6 Cherry Street #3, Somerville, MA. Date unknown. “Sweetie — I’m sorry I went to Cooperstown without you. I’m sorry I called you skinnier than Jesus on the cross. I’m sorry about what happened at dinner last week. Wish you were here. The history of baseball is rich and fascinating. Yours, K. Sugar.” *** This one was never sent. It’s all apology. Maybe I’ll send it to C, just to cover my bases.

If I’m Your Nurse a lex butler

Originally published in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency I am a nurse who scrubs and circulates mostly trauma surgeries at Massachusetts General Hospital — the gunshots, the stabbings, the motor vehicle accidents are my typical bread and butter. My day usually tips to the high-stress, be-readyfor-anything end of things. I’ve seen enough foreign objects come out of people’s abdominal cavities that you could fill a bookcase, but I still consider myself a new nurse. If anything, I’ve learned to become adaptive. That humility I’ve gained helped me when I saw more and more of my operating room coworkers redeployed to different parts of the hospital in March of 2020 — to the MedSurg floors to help prone patients, to the ICUs to help educate nurses how to don and doff gowns and gloves using sterile technique, to the Boston Hope Field hospital where 1,000 beds were prepped for COVID patients and homeless individuals. Even my wife, a physical therapist, was deployed there. Yet still, I remained in one of the few Operating Rooms that were left open. We were down to a skeleton crew who focused on the emergent and urgent cases. Traumas, sadly, still happen on a regular basis. Our routines became a bit different. Patients who were COVID positive, or even COVID risk, were transported directly into the operating room. Here, I met them wearing my PPE — the notorious n95 mask, a face shield, gloves, a hair cap, a paper-thin yellow gown — and we began to operate. Even with all of those precautions, my imagination would run wild. Every tingle in my throat was the virus entering my body. Every sneeze, every cough was a warning sign, a newly developing symptom. Or was it just allergies? Was the room normally this warm? Or was I getting feverish? Weeks went by like this. Then months. We’re now opening more operating rooms and calling back some of our deployed staff. And even though things are getting somewhat back to “normal,” the underlying anxiety is still there. And it’s very, very difficult. Nurses are not trained to keep their distance from their patients or to treat them like a potential threat. We embrace the sick or wounded and hold their hands at the bedside, reassuring them that they are not alone. And though it may sound self-righteous, that’s something I will not stop doing. Through all this madness, I want my patients to remember that they are never the threat. They are people. And if I’m your nurse, right before anesthesia induction, I’ll be holding your hand. 21

Enough Zucchini for a Small Family nata lie ga le

How to live at home and how to grow your own deck produce. Last summer I grew two zucchini. Only two. I underestimated the size of the pot the zucchini seedling I bought from the farm down the road would need to grow comfortably on my back porch. Then I underestimated the size again when I repotted the bush-sized zucchini plant and broke two of its stems in the process. By the time the plant reached its final resting place, it had suffered too much trauma to produce more than two zucchini. I don’t know how much zucchini I was expecting, other than what I learned from a tidbit of online information that said a full-sized zucchini plant should produce enough zucchini for a small family. That was an arbitrary unit of measure. What’s a “small family?” What’s “enough?” The plant was dead by July. Collapsed and withered brown on my deck after providing its earnest offering of two medium-sized zucchini. Dead were my dreams of crispy zucchini frites sprinkled in parmesan and dipped in marinara, or of freshly baked zucchini bread like the kind we used to get at that pub in New Hampshire. I naively harbored these dreams in April when the world was thawing and a summer of doing absolutely nothing unfolded before me. I had been living at home since September of 2019, and I knew this pandemic world would see me homebound indefinitely. But I had many more domestic endeavors to keep me busy. I began sewing more seriously, making masks for healthcare workers facing PPE shortages throughout April and May. After honing my skills for a few months, I sewed myself a dress. It took more hours than it was worth, but I’ve never known anything like the rush of creating something tactile and pretty (and useful). There’s freedom in knowing I can alter my own clothes, too. I’ve knitted a couple hats and given them to people I love. I buckled down on baking too—trying to perfect my French macarons. I grew some other goodies on the porch, and was proudest of my sweet little strawberries. And in my most ambitious crafting endeavor to date, I started making my own candles. Stuck at home, I’m lucky to say I blossomed. The year 2020 wasn’t so kind to most folks. I’ve always been a maker—collecting seashells from the beach and turning them into necklaces, pressing wildflowers between a dictionary and a

bible and gluing them to birthday cards—and this time at home provided me with fertilizer. And enough sleep for once. “I feel like I can’t grow here,” a friend also living at home texted me. “I feel like I’m charging my battery,” I replied. Simple joys of the domestic world unfurled around me, teaching me new lessons about myself. But simultaneously, the actual world around me looked tiny, and has stayed that small for much longer than I expected. When will I ever feel safe enough to get on a plane again? To meet new people? And, worst of all, where is a writer to find meaningful work that pays the bills in this economy? Time soldiered on. As the weather got colder, my leaves also began to wither a bit. At first I couldn’t understand why. As feelings of loneliness and the mess in my bedroom crept back simultaneously, I understood that my fertilizer was being used up. I know now that when I repotted that little zucchini seedling, I should have put it in the biggest pot I could find. In fact, this spring, I might just put it straight into the ground and try and grow the biggest zucchini plant you’ve ever seen. We all need room to grow our roots: deck plants, you, and me. Even if the pot looks so freakishly large at first, it might not even be big enough. Discomfort means there’s room to grow. Please excuse me while I go write a Craigslist ad. I’m in the market for an uncomfortably large pot.

Autonomy tom fogg

I read some weeks ago that autonomy requires the release of awareness, spontaneity, and intimacy. As I read the word intimacy, I shuddered, as though a truth had given way somewhere deep within, like a rotten branch. Deliberately tripping on this branch, I now find myself tumbling down a rabbit hole of ideas, my face being scratched as I fall by lofty words such as semantics, ethics, temptation, and innocence. Walking through an apple orchard on Thursday, I mumbled something about innocence being a requisite of intimacy. I had been bouncing a tennis ball, as is my want, and this thought arrived out of space. As always, it was as though I’d always known it. Innocence is a state of being where it is impossible to be held to account for an action. A child is innocent because he hasn’t been made aware of the consequences of an action by society, or society’s agents: parents and teachers. When we first fall in love, we emit a cloying odour of innocence. Lust fuels the vehicle but we may not have identified it yet, so we continue innocently. Things happen and later, we realise that we aren’t so innocent anymore. Later still, when the sting has softened, we are aware that we weren’t so culpable after all. We were doing our best with the tools available but we nonetheless hurt people along the way. Later still, after time spent in reflection (before Kentish copses of blue bells in bloom) a peaceful innocence seems to return to us. It’s like being given another chance. Is it possible then, perhaps in wishing to fall in love at the age of 44, to be innocent by choice? Hurtling back through time, blasting past the Augean heaps of my past, I notice the shameful mendacity and prevarication inherent in being a lustful man. I Want, so I’ll twist the truth until I Get, then deny the twisting. It’s the work of psychopaths but lower down the scale. I remember my innocence ebbing away, and my proud indifference, almost an exultation, like Dorian Grey wearing long trousers for the first time. It’s written that Jesus spent 40 days and nights in the wilderness being tempted by the Devil. In a Judean desert, Lucifer, son of the morning, tempts Jesus via his mind, body, and soul by offering him treats which might assuage the suffering he was now experiencing. One involved filling his belly with bread made from stone (hedonism), another offered vast wealth on his return from isolation (materialism) and the last option necessitated God’s angels preventing a gruesome result from a leap off a temple roof (ego). Curious this last, given Satan’s history as an angel having fallen from God’s grace. 25

After rejecting Satan’s advances, the hero returns to Galilee to set up his ministry. It’s a personal trial, involving fasting, to allow the distractions of secular life to fall silent before the infinite magnificence of time and space, that exquisite vibration. Organised religion, as with cults, and tribal witch doctors attempt to crow bar their followers into this state of grace with cold church pews, effortful choral singing, chanting, peyote, etc. On the face of it the story seems full of holes. Holes I recall remarking privately during Sunday school (on perfect summers’ days) in a damp church in rural Buckinghamshire but as a metaphor for the psychic benefits of stoic abstinence, it’s pretty strong. One might parallel Jesus’ trip to the wilderness as a journey into himself, through meditation for example. In this heretical version, the Devil is playing the part of the Id, that coarser neighbour from the other side of the psyche’s tracks that proffers beer, black Range Rovers, and Instagram likes in the stead of inner redemption and greater self-awareness. From this, it’s not a huge leap to parallel God as the eternal father, with his solemn monologues preaching virtues to which we can only fall short. For sure, the lustful period, with its outward displays of virility and fortitude were necessary up to a point but these qualities become redundant as we get older. As they wane, as our psyche moves away from Tarzan (with grace Tom, with grace) towards more androgynous heros, we face crises as men. These qualities once defined us and would have us stick around for ‘one more for the road.’ For me my early adulthood (from the age of 17 or so, through to quite recently if I’m honest), was piloted by my Id. A psychotherapist might characterise this behaviour as a displaced animus; an inability to readily or meaningfully relate. This strikes a chord. Another approach is to look at how a child instinctively understands intimacy, and therefore love. In structural analysis this is a given; the natural child is capable of expressing intimacy until the function is mucked about by the intervention of games, mostly played by adults not in tune with their adult ego state. I have a good idea about when and how I lost the full function of intimacy, and the games 26

I developed in turn to avoid showing it when I felt uncomfortable within. My son is helping me correct this flaw. It wasn’t until I gave up the folly of denying my age and how my body represented it that I came through the mists of ignorance on all this and arrived at cliffs overlooking the savannahs of happy living left to me before I die. The journey down the path from those cliffs to the cool Argan glades beneath involves an embrace of innocence. It involves the risk of allowing my full self to be visible to someone I care for. I have to allow myself to fail. ‘It’s OK. I didn’t know. I’m sorry. I understand now. I’ll try my best. Please be patient with me. All this, but most of all, ‘Thank You.’ To reach intimacy from innocence requires trust. Something I’m learning from a new friend. The motif involved a bridge but I forgot to use it.

Dispatches m a x cohen

Thursday, March 12th (2020): An Introduction Time: 4:06pm EST Weather: 45 degrees Fahrenheit, and cloudy Begin Dispatch: Right now, somewhere way up above us, a Tesla Roadster hurtles through the cosmos, blasting David Bowie out into the vacuum of space, and bearing, on the dashboard, a two-word message for any intergalactic inspector: Don’t Panic! it reads. Let’s take that as a symbol, shall we? Don’t Panic! For it is written in the stars. Actually. Don’t Panic! We’re all repeating this refrain to ourselves ad nauseum, probably ignoring it, but can you blame us? Can you blame me for doing the same? I’m 24 and sitting on a rooftop in Cambridge, Massachusetts, blinking back visions of the apocalypse. Far too much Armageddoning for a Thursday, methinks. Perhaps you’ve heard, but, well, it’s not such a great time to live in Cambridge. If you’re unaware, however, of what’s currently happening here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, take it from me: it’s a pretty dismal place to be. Here: apparently the state’s Coronavirus epicenter. Like right here. Like a few blocks west. You see, some employees from Biogen, a Cambridge-based pharmaceutical company, recently attended a conference at the Long Wharf Marriott, the famously cruise-ship-shaped lodging which overlooks Boston harbor, and therein came into unknowing contact with a Covid-19 carrier. And then they, of course, became infected. And then they, of course, infected others. So on, and so forth, throughout the Greater Boston Metropolitan Area. And now, on Thursday the 12th of March 2020, we know things are about to get worse, but we’re not sure when, and we’re not sure in what ways. Return to the mantra with me. Don’t Panic! For it is written in the stars, and when will we learn to heed the constellations? Writing this for you is important to me. It’s important to me that you can see what life is really like here in this tense and dangerous place. Here, you might bypass the masochistic news perspective, or that of your paranoiac college friends, ditto the politiqueras, and hear from a reasonably unbiased individual, with his boots on the ground and his eyes upon this thing as it swells and shapeshifts in ways we can’t possibly predict. That’s why I’m here, doing this. Because right now, despite all the end-times prognostication you may be hearing, a lady in a blue hat is walking her dog. Because there are children in neon vests in the park 29

on the next block. Because I went for a jog today, and despite the disconcerting number of people wearing surgical masks, there wasn’t total ghost town silence, and there wasn’t alarm. Panic hasn’t set in. Yet. And as these cases skyrocket, as our friends and family collect their own horror stories, as I myself keep all errant humanity at a six-foot distance (woah, easy there, big fella), I want to give you a direct lens into at least one life being led right here, where things ain’t fixin’ to get better any time soon. A lot of seemingly simple things may be hard to do during the odd time to come. Refraining from reflection will, I suspect, be one for me. Existential threats to society spark a mind’s meandering, and my own mind is already prey to the weirdness, to the swelling fear, to the atom bomb blast we know now nears us, but at a speed we do not know, with a force we cannot imagine. Meander with me, if you like. It seems we’re going to be cooped up inside for the foreseeable future, and maybe you could, you know, use a friend for all this? Lord knows I can. Be my friend? Please? Let’s ramble and remember this: it’s all going to be okay in the end. It always has been, at least. Let’s really try to take that Tesla’s advice: Don’t Panic! If it’s good enough for the first car in space, it’s good enough for me. Sigh. Deep breath. A bird twitters down across the roof, wary of the dirty slippers clucking at it. A purple train speeds out to the suburbs upon a distant track, cruising loud enough to shake the whole city. Someone in denim lights a cigar. The air smells like cinnamon. Life does what it always does: it goes on. End Dispatch. Wednesday, April 7th (2021): A Response Time: 1:51pm EST Weather: 55 degrees Fahrenheit, and partly cloudy Begin Dispatch: Don’t Panic! Those words grounded all 94 of my Dispatches from the Roof. Dispatches disguised itself as a blog but was really an unrefined outlet for my daily musings as I, and everyone else, waded toe-first into the dimly-lit and impossibly-deep pool of pandemic life. Don’t Panic! Douglas Adams wrote those words first. They were an imperative; a command; a fucking plea. Something you might do for my sake, if you could. When I was asked if “Thursday, March 12th” might be reprinted for Of Juliet, my memory, like some sick old dog, promptly spit up the details of that day, which had burned themselves into my brain. March 12th, 2020 was cold and calm and cloudy. In a pair of ratty Uggs, I trudged up to the roof of my three-story East Cambridge walk-up, settled myself down on the roofing rubber, lit a cigarette, and just started typing. I was terrified, and antsy, and all my emotions emerged over the course of 800 words. There was this, you know, thing, in front of me. Hell, it was here. “Like right here,” I’d written. Facing a situation I could hardly comprehend, I 30

imagined all the things which would soon change. My city, my routine, my mind. Everything would go, I figured, or otherwise become unrecognizable. If I’ve learned anything in this time, however, it’s that life moves gradually. Come flood or famine or grand personal tragedy, life continues moving at its maddeningly consistent pace. Is it slow? Is it quick? Both and somehow neither, but always consistent. There is always, for instance, breakfast to consider. A plant to water, and a leaky faucet, and a hissing radiator. We imagine panic, but never subject it to minutia. The change we fear is also confined to 24 measly hours a day. Hardly anything sets in suddenly. I’m reminded of the other major shifts in my life: that first day living away from my parents; the deaths of close friends; the post-collegiate plunge into a wide and frustrating world. All huge changes which fundamentally alter a life. And yet, was there ever a moment I could look back upon and say “There! That was the day I fundamentally changed too.” ? In the past year, I’ve traded religions, jobs, relationships, and basic belief systems in what has been, astoundingly, the most metamorphic year of my life. But, despite all that, did I ever cease to be Max? For even one moment, as the basic fabric of my life unraveled, was I not always completely and comfortably me? Are you familiar with the Ship of Theseus? As the thought experiment goes, Theseus, the hallowed Greek hero, slayer of beasts and son of Poseidon, finally returned to Athens to take the throne, leaving his legendary ship floating in the harbor. Upon his death, the Athenians pulled Theseus’ boat onto land so that it could be gazed upon and lauded and preserved for generations to come. And it was! Naturally, however, certain planks rotted and required replacement, but only ever a few at a time. The decaying boards were swapped for stronger ones, and thus, the ship maintained its integrity in perpetuity. But many, many years passed, as they’re wont to do, and the original planks grew fewer all the time. Eventually, not a single one remained. Piece-by-piece, Theseus’ ship had been entirely replaced. And thus, we must ask: Is that still Theseus’ ship? Can we gauge such incremental change? The radical, society-wide shifts we so fear, don’t they seem, in hindsight, more like piecemeal restructurings than the bizarro transmogrifications of our nightmares? Our world has changed completely, fundamentally, and yet, everything still feels…somehow…natural. Sunrise, sunset. Birds and trains and the neighbor’s cigar. A subtle doomsday has indeed befallen us, and yet you remain you, and I me. Does everything not feel, strangely, like it always has? Say it with me, doing your best Jerry Seinfeld’s impression: “I’ve heard people can adapt to anything...but this is ridiculous!” What have I been doing since Thursday, March 12th, 2020, you might ask? I’ve been changing, I suppose. So, I suspect, have you. Did you realize? Don’t Panic! You’ve done this before. You’ve always been doing it. You’re already old hand. End Dispatch.

The Farmer Comes to the Table a r iel k noebel

Sue was driving from Maine to New York City to deliver whole hogs to Cochon 555, part of an annual tour of culinary competitions focused on heritage and local sourcing, when restaurants started cancelling orders last February. Up until that point, 95% of her eight-year-old business was selling half and whole hogs to upscale restaurants across New England and New York. Purchasing a whole animal is big for a restaurant; it requires a high upfront cost, skill to break the animal down, meticulous menu planning to use each piece, and a strong customer base to sell many dishes. In late winter 2020, restaurants were beginning to close down for an indeterminate period of time due to the emerging coronavirus pandemic. Meanwhile, Sue says, “I had kind of a mad scramble of what to do with these pigs that were all ready to go. It costs money to keep these pigs.” No one was in the market for 300 pounds of heritage breed pork. Sue Frank, owner of Dogpatch Farms in Washington, Maine, has been growing Mulefoot pigs on her 24 acres of wooded, rocky, hilly farmland since 2012. This American heritage breed pig is named for its distinctive hoof, which is not cloven like most pig breeds, but one piece (like a horse or, notably, a mule). They are likely descendants of Spanish hogs brought to the Americas in the 1500s, but much of their history is unknown. Despite being popularly bred in the early 1900s, mulefoots are now critically rare, with less than 500 registered purebred hogs in America. Sue’s farm has about 180 pigs, both purebreds and crossbreeds, at any given time. Mulefoot pigs are popular amongst chefs for their superior flavor and fat content; they regularly win taste tests and industry competitions. Amongst farmers, they have a reputation for their docile, friendly temperament and manageable size — averaging 400-600 pounds, in contrast to other breeds that can easily top 1,000. There’s a reason that you won’t find Mulefoot pork on your regular grocery store shelves, though. It’s expensive. Mulefoots are slow-growing, meaning they need more time on the farm before heading to market, where they can finally contribute to the farmer’s bottom line. The breed fares best as free range foragers, and were unable to convert well to industrial factory farming, which is designed to grow animals as big as possible as fast as possible and pack them into the smallest square footage possible to maintain low prices on the commodity market. By choosing to farm Mulefoots, Sue is participating in invaluable conservation work, saving a heritage breed from extinction by creating a market for their meat — and an incentive for farmers to continue to breed them. “Breed-wise, I picked Mulefoot.” Sue explains, “because it needed help, it was critically rare, and it won blind taste tests.” Restaurants and specialty outlets are generally the 33

majority of customers excited to pay top dollar for exceptional quality, and to support local economies and conservation efforts. They are one main reason that these types of heritage ingredients remain available. When the pandemic closed down those restaurants, 95% of Sue’s business vanished overnight with no clear way forward. The entire food supply was turned on end, which actually worked to Sue’s advantage in some ways. While she was working out her next steps, she says, “out West, people working in the processing plants were getting sick, and plants were closing down. So, as the stores were all running out of pork because all the big wigs closed down, I was able to provide a lot of local people with pork.” Sue had recently started working with her local pork processor on a new business plan for 2020: to package and sell primal cuts of meat as a compromise for her buyers. These cuts would be an easier investment than a whole or half hog, but wouldn’t add too many extra steps for this stretched thin one-woman show. Because she was already thinking this way, she was able to work with her processor to quickly pivot, and cut her pigs earmarked for restaurant customers into retail-packaging. She says, “that was my saving grace, but in all this handling one pound packages, half pound packages, whatever. That’s a lot more packages, a lot more scale, a lot more places to try to sell those, and it’s still just me.” Sue added extra storage plans, inventory, packaging, and wholesaling to local markets through New England to her existing responsibilities . Suddenly, she had a lot more administrative work than her previous one-day-per-week restaurant delivery route. Over the summer, she was able to sell in some local farmers markets in Maine and New Hampshire, but she also started marketing directly to her followers online. She would post “tailgate pickup” days to her followers, who would place orders for heavily discounted grab bags of farmer’s choice cuts of pork and pick them up in a parking lot at a designated time. “When other companies were gouging people because there was a shortage, I was dropping my prices. Number one, because people needed to eat. Number two, I needed my pigs to eat; so that was my way of making sure that I could buy feed for the pigs.” This new business model meant much more work, and more time off the farm, for less profit than she would get from selling whole hogs, but “that’s how I was able to survive this year,” Sue says. There was a big upside to all this extra work, though: more people were eating her pork. “I find I really do love getting my pork into more homes.” reflects Sue, “I’ll be honest, my restaurant clientele have been upscale restaurants, places I cannot afford to eat, basically, which means there’s an awful lot of people that can’t afford to eat in those restaurants unless it’s a special occasion. So, for people to be able to buy my pork at your local farmer’s market, there’s a lot more people that are actually getting to enjoy happy pigs.” For Sue, like so many small farmers and producers, the pandemic actually brought her closer to her customers by creating an outlet for them to source directly from her, something that would never have been available to anyone without 5 cubic feet of freezer space and some serious butchering skills before the pandemic. 34

As restaurants across the Northeast began to reopen, Sue began to get orders from her typical restaurant customers again. Additionally, she is continuing to explore more ways to get her pork to people who want it. “Not all eggs will be in one basket again,” Sue explains that her business will be changed forever from this past year; “with 95% being in the restaurant business before, and now I see what happened. So, if I split it up then it won’t be so devastating if something happens again in the future.” She’s in the early stages of converting a guest house on her property into a butcher shop, where she could sell her own house-made sausages and cured meats, and considering whole hog barbeque in the future. These projects would allow her not only to continue breeding her pigs, but create jobs within her local economy, and end up pocketing more money per pig than by paying a processor to cut things down for her. That’s not to say it’s fair weather from here, by any means. The restaurant industry, and the farms that rely on it, are still treading on thin ice as the summer months usher in outdoor dining and vaccine rollouts tentatively promise a safer future. “Every week, I’m surprised I get through, but it doesn’t stop the anxiety. I know I’m not alone; everybody’s going through this with the pandemic, but we’re still making it though.” For Sue, like so many of us, the past year has changed her life. Her job now is to take the lessons learned and build something better, rather than letting the setbacks of the pandemic put her behind. She can’t, there is no time. There are still pigs to feed, bills to pay, miles of fence line to check.“Any given day there will be someone wandering in the yard,” she laughs. “As long as they stay out of the road, I’m okay with it.” To buy pork from Sue, or learn more about the farm, visit dogpatchfarm.net.

How the Hell Am I Supposed to Cook Right Now m aya k aczor Dinner in my house has always been a family affair. Just like every other meal, it’s made by my father. When I was a kid, I would join him in the kitchen, sometimes just for a few minutes and sometimes for an hour or two. There was a day, around age eight, when I decided I wanted to learn to cook for real. I was going to write down my father’s recipes for myself, and one day I would wow my friends and family with everything I knew. I found an empty notebook and announced this when my dad said it was time to start making dinner. The first recipe I wrote down: boiled cauliflower. Step one: Break the cauliflower down into pieces. Step two: Blanch in boiling water so it doesn’t stink up the kitchen. Step three: Boil for real until it reached a Polish-immigrant-parent-approved level of over-doneness. Something along those lines. I don’t think I wrote down anything else after that. I think I realized it was overkill. But I stayed in the kitchen. I learned how to boil more vegetables, because that was what Polish immigrant parents did with their veggies. How to scramble my own eggs, low and slow so they were rich and creamy. How to properly slice a tomato, eaten with breakfast almost every day. How to cube and slice and sear beef for stews and stroganoff. Over the last few years, my dad wasn’t home as much. My grandmother’s health started to decline, so he would fly to Poland and spend weeks or months taking care of her, pushing his return back every time complications arose. My mom and I would fend for ourselves for breakfast and lunch, but I would cook dinner most nights. Eventually Dad would come home, and the old routine returned. Wake up to him scrambling eggs, eat a sandwich he made me for lunch, ask him “What’s for dinner?” between emails and meetings for work. Things were different when the pandemic hit. We switched to working from home. My parents and I were home, together, all the time. My dad ended up in a rut, recycling recipes, the same meals made over and over. I volunteered to cook more and Friday was reserved for dinner by me. My grandmother got worse. My dad flew back to Poland late last year and quarantined in my grandmother’s apartment while she was in the hospital. I went to the grocery store during lunch and cooked dinner for my mom and I. I found myself in the same rut he had been in - dinner was some variation of the same couple of things. I was losing steam. We got a free box from a meal kit service and decided maybe it was worth it to avoid the stress of planning out meals ourselves. 37

On January 13th, I had been planning the next day’s dinner - nothing too fancy, but I knew I was getting lazy, so I was trying to put in a little more effort than I had been recently. I woke up the next day to the news that my grandmother had passed away. She hadn’t been doing well the last time I visited her in Poland, back in the summer of 2019. There was a sense of finality when I said goodbye and went to the airport, but I tried to be optimistic. I had hoped she would make it through the pandemic, so that I would be able to see her one more time. My greatest fear had been that I wouldn’t be able to be there for her funeral, and it came true. The day we got the news, the last thing I wanted to do was cook dinner. I messaged my boss and took the day off, spent the morning lying on the couch rewatching old episodes of House to try and make my brain feel numb. I dragged myself to the grocery store, bought a pint of ice cream for my mom - New York Super Fudge Chunk - and a pint for myself - Caramel Chocolate Cheesecake. In the parking lot, juggling the shopping bags and the car keys, I lost my grip. Ben and Jerry went rolling underneath the car and the tears started flowing again. As I crawled on the ground to pick them up, I started laughing through the tears. I got back in the car and texted one of my best friends to relay the story: “the jokes write themselves… it seemed like the bit of a romcom when cameron diaz hits rock bottom or whatever so it was kind of funny.” I picked up my ice cream and went home. My sister and her husband came over and I made dinner like I had planned, even though I was sniffling the whole time. Sweet potatoes, green beans, salmon with paprika and garlic and some other seasonings I can’t remember, a spicy green goddess-like sauce with yogurt and cilantro and jalapeno. It wasn’t an elaborate meal, but I couldn’t tell you the last time I made one that compares to it. Most of our meals since then have been ones my dad cooked and froze before his departure. Plenty of goulash and chicken tikka masala, pierogi we didn’t get around to eating on Christmas Eve. We’ve managed to show restraint when it comes to ordering takeout, but we’ve still had sushi once a week or so. Every so often, my mom pulls out a pound of chicken thighs or a salmon filet. She says something along the lines of “How about this for dinner?” and that’s my cue to start brainstorming. But what was a chore a month ago is torture now, because how the hell am I supposed to want to cook right now? Every time I just nod and say “Okay, I’ll think of something,” but when 5:30 rolls around and I log off from work, I sit on the couch, dragging time out as long as possible until I realize that if I don’t start cooking now, when the hell are we going to eat? I’m tired. I mean really. I haven’t slept well in weeks. I rotate through a roster of over the counter sleep supplements, but I can’t remember the last time I slept through the night. It’s not just that that I’m tired of. I’m tired of grieving - of feeling okay for a few hours, or even days, and then remembering that something terrible happened and feeling sad all over again, along with feeling guilty about not being sad nonstop. I’m tired of not even being able to have my best friend give 38

me a hug and take me to the diner to cheer me up. I’m tired of cooking, which used to be fun and now is a chore about as enjoyable as cleaning the litter box. I’m tired of being tired. I feel burnt out like never before, like work and play are equally impossible. I feel like I’m waiting for something to happen so life suddenly clicks back to normal, my sleep schedule sorts itself out, and I stop feeling pangs in my chest that make me start crying for no reason. Maybe under normal circumstances that would happen, and the grief would ebb away until things feel okay again, like when my other grandparents passed away. But these aren’t normal circumstances. Even when the grief stops, we’ll still be in the middle of a global pandemic, in the middle of crisis after crisis. I don’t know what to expect. Nobody does. I’ve gone back to making dumb jokes with my friends every day instead of muting all of our group chats, I got drunk on my birthday with my sister and ate too many taquitos, and I’ve joined a weekly Dungeons and Dragons game on Zoom with my friends. But I still don’t know how to feel normal. Unfortunately, I’m still waiting on someone to write a book called Things to Do to Get Over Your Grief During an Unprecedented Global Crisis. The one thing I haven’t gotten back to is cooking. I think I’ve always been something of an emotional eater: to see sharing a meal with friends as a sacred act, a plate of pastries as a gift made with love, a cherished recipe as a secret to be held close and shared with those worthy of it. I love the act of cheering when someone blows out the candles and cuts into their birthday cake, spooning a serving of a hot meal onto a loved one’s plate, the oohs and ahhs when you bring out the dessert you didn’t let anyone see until it was time to tuck in. Food as a joyous thing - I think that might be what I need more of right now. We got a foot and a half of snow last week. The plow on our street didn’t go all the way to the curb, so we had to clear our driveway along with half the cul de sac. Our neighbor came by to help, and when we got back inside, I turned to my mom and said, “I haven’t baked in a while, I think I should make something for Jim as a thank you.” She nodded and said, “I was going to say the same thing!” On Saturday, while my mom ran errands, I took out my butter and eggs so they could warm up to room temperature and went to the grocery store. It was packed, everyone anticipating another storm plus the Super Bowl - both things had somehow slipped my mind. But I made my way through the crowds, two masks over my face, moving my feet with purpose. I know the aisles of that ShopRite like my own house. I went home and I turned on one of my carefully curated playlists, this one appropriately entitled “Kitchen Dance Party.” The first song that came on was an uptempo, utterly saccharine K-pop song by girl group TWICE. The next was Abba. I like to take my time baking, to devote time to weighing and measuring all the ingredients, making sure the bowl of my stand mixer is sparkling clean. I was making a coffee cake - not exactly rocket science. But I spent three hours in the kitchen, letting the music play obnoxiously loud, dancing as badly as humanly possible to mid-2000s pop hits and 80s one hit wonders, doing the math in my 39

head as I weighed out brown sugar, then white sugar, then cardamom and cinnamon and flour. I think, for the first time in a while, I might have felt a little more normal than usual. Dinner that night was takeout, leftovers the next day. Tonight we’re defrosting whatever’s been sitting on the top shelf of our freezer. I think I need to cook again to feel normal, but the idea of throwing myself back into it headfirst makes me squeamish. My mom and I have decided to order those meal kits again. Our first box in months arrives tomorrow. I think for the time being, it’s better to let someone else do the work of being inspired in the kitchen so I can cut to the chase and throw everything in a pan. But I’ve gone ahead and let myself scroll through food blogs, bookmark a few recipes that look like fun. I don’t think I’ll make any of them this week, but I think I might be getting there.

Melt gr acie gr iffin

It’s a late start to spring in Maine. Boughs have budded but not bloomed and I wish we wouldn’t hold on so tightly to the seasons or our expectations. I wish I could take a deep breath. The last time I felt free was February 8th with the slow-moving shift of breaths in chests, the decadence of tomorrow and flakes of snow. The lake was an illusion of infinity and I was sure that if I stood still enough, it would rock me to sleep, that the ice would bend and fold and hold me. Ice skates are the closest we can get to trusting ourselves to both float and fall, finding propulsion in the moments in-between, finding stability in the slice, carving prayers into the surface of the earth, faith rewritten. Our bodies drifted apart and back together, our blades tracing the perimeters of our bliss, chasing each other and the end of daylight and the shoreline, and leaving the limitation of heartbeats behind. Today, rain streaks my window in whorls and I wish I could paint the patterns on my skin and feel this day deeply, instead of watching it wash itself away before it was already done, instead of sinking and slipping away to the day we walked on glass, effortless and lost amidst the snow and the sky, when we harnessed falling for fun, when we cut away at the one thing that was holding us up.

How To: Paint a Rock a Day k a r in hoelzl

In October 2020, I hit the sweet sweet breaking point of panic and boredom. I’m an actor, and while that felt hard to say in January, it’s become almost impossible now. So I’ve had to resort to calling myself an artist, which is… complicated. Stage, print, canvas, a family dinner table, I used to make my art anywhere, any way. But in this unending fever dream that is a global pandemic, I have no idea really how to express my creativity, meaning I really don’t know how to be myself. I don’t think any of us do. So after six months of spiraling, I decided to look at my creative practice as an actual need. I’m an artist, and I need to make art. I challenged myself to pick up a paintbrush every single day of October… and then I made it weird. This is how I did it. Make your rules: Every day of October, I would paint a rock. Fondly titled, Rocktober. Make your why: I wanted to feel like an artist again. I have a lot of creative energy that is not healthy to leave untethered. While it’s not realistic to practice a daily form of creativity and expect it to be good, it is supremely helpful to begin to learn how to push through the bad art and ~trUsT thE ProCceSs~ Make it FUN: If I was going to successfully burden myself with 31 painted rocks (seriously, they’re just sitting on the floor of my parents’ dining room, what does one do with 31 painted rocks?), I had to like doing it. So I picked rocks from special places, I bought a new color of paint when I felt like it, I made a playlist (standout songs: Roxanne, Roxie, We Rock, and Norman fucking Rockwell) and I told my friends. It’s much nicer to have a workout buddy. And creativity is a beast of a muscle. Make it easy: Or, as easy as possible. If a rock looks like a fish, paint a fish. If you’re in a big bad mood, write that on a rock. If you really just like glow in the dark stuff, buy some glow in the dark paint and go ham. If I relaxed enough (this got much harder as the month went on), most of the rocks would tell me what to paint. I know. I said it. But actually, rocks are not blank canvases, and every time I wished they were flat, white surfaces, I was making it harder. Make a mess: I didn’t write King Lear, but I did paint 31 rocks. And I’m very proud of that. I painted even when I didn’t think I had any good ideas. I painted when I was in a really bad mood. I painted when I doubted that it mattered. Because it did. We’re still in a pandemic, but now I have 31 painted rocks and no excuses. I’m an artist, even on my worst days. “All the world’s a stage, especially the rocks” 45

Katie’s Corner Pandemic Parenting k atie rosengr en

Lately, my mind keeps wandering back to March 2020. I guess like most things, it’s because the passage of time seems intangible, until we lay our structure over it with months, and notably, years. The uncertainty of those early days, when things changed in a moment but lasted forever. Before we became accustomed to our new normal. Specifically, I think about the right before. The first weekend of March, Cole, Henry, and I took our first family trip, a weekend in New York. It was the first weekend I had off since returning to work after my maternity leave. This was going to be our new normal, weekends together, visiting family and friends. I remember the day Henry’s daycare closed indefinitely. We went to pick up his things, say goodbye to his teachers. When asked if I wanted to take his inside shoes, the ones he would change into from his boots everyday I said no. I thought he’d be back soon and it just didn’t seem worth it. Such a small detail reminds me of how little we knew, how unprepared we were. Henry was born on a Sunday, 2 weeks early. Well within the time to be considered full term, but a surprise nonetheless. When I was leaving work that Friday afternoon, Katrina asked me if I’d be back on Monday, and I assured her I would. I ended up sending an email to Josh and Katrina the next day, passing off the things they’d need to know between the time that my water broke and my labor started. Sixteen hours after my water broke, and 10 hours after my first contraction, Henry was born in the posterior position (sunny side up for my restaurant friends). My world was fundamentally different. I’ve worked in restaurants for over a decade. I’ve worked countless 12 hour plus shifts, carrying and running. Nothing prepared me for the absolute exhaustion of a new baby, especially one who would refuse to sleep through the night until he was 13 months old. Everything was in service to this beautiful little human and I had no idea where to put myself anymore, or who that person even was. I was tired and bored and lonely. Sometimes Henry and I cried together, a shared expression of us trying to figure out this new world that didn’t make sense. I returned to work part time when Henry was 4 months old. It was another adjustment, another layer to the difficulties of being a parent. And yet, I started to feel like myself again. I got to leave my house, I got to be the person I was before. I was just starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Just about 2 years after Henry was born, I was getting the schedule I wanted. And then the world turned upside down. In those early days, I tried to fill our time with projects. We made muffins. We enjoyed the early spring weather on daily walks. In the absence of playgrounds, 47

we found curbs to climb and fields to run across. I attempted to work with Henry home for about a week until I realized I just couldn’t do it. The upended schedule meant no one was sleeping well. Cole was still working, and just like those early days, we’d shift around our 3 rooms to accommodate the phone calls and naps. I was never alone. I was tired and bored and lonely, but it wasn’t new anymore. I took maternity leave because my body had to heal and I had to adjust to caring for a new baby. It made sense. I took leave from my job during the pandemic because our restaurants were mostly closed and I had the flexibility Cole didn’t. It made sense. But things that are sensible don’t always make us happy. I felt waves of emotion, sometimes slow and lapping, sometimes crashing and violent. I was left again railing against the situation I had no control over that pushed the parts of me I find comfort in so far into the margins, I didn’t know if I would ever get them back. Much like the false starts of spring New Englanders have grown to expect, there is a moderate amount of hope that the worst of the pandemic is behind us, though I’m not convinced there isn’t one more blizzard in our future. The pandemic laid bare the many ills of our society, and there isn’t going to be a quick fix for those. Among the myriad issues, we’ll need to address what happens to the women who’ve lost a year of their professional lives to distance learning and caring for their families. Better yet, let’s not stop with just the last year, and think about how we can pay women for the invisible work they’ve been doing for generations.

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