The Last Word On Nothing

Last week, I was one of the small minority of American workers who was continuing to work from home because of the pandemic. And I didn’t really feel like I was in a rush to get back. But then my company announced that we could go back if we wanted, and I thought…actually, maybe it would be nice to work somewhere other than my living room for a day. So, this Tuesday, for the first time in two years and six days, I went to work.

So I worked. And at the end of the day, I packed up my stuff, rode down in the elevator, headed out the door, turned toward the southeast, and walked home.

I used to do this pretty often. I’ve written about it before. The walk takes me past restaurants and car repair shops and train tracks and parks, and I get to catch up with the plants and buildings along the way.

A few things have changed in the last two years in that mile-and-a-half stretch of suburbia.

Whoever’s running the community garden seems to have gotten more fearful. A new sign warns that only people with permits are allowed to enter, and says to report vandalism, theft, or suspicious activity to Park Police. The garden has always seemed like such a nice place, and I’m a little sad that they’ve had the kind of trouble that made them feel like they should put up a sign. And I wonder what the trouble was. Stealing tomatoes? Sleeping behind the compost bin?

The storage place across the street from that garden used to have one redeeming feature: a stretch of lawn, maybe 10 feet wide, running along the front of the big ugly block of a building. Against the wall was a row of low shrubs. Sometimes in the afternoon, I saw rabbits in the grass. Now they’ve replaced all of those plants with gravel. This building’s current count of redeeming features: zero.

A few businesses closed, and a few opened. New apartments buildings went up. The community college is putting up a new science building. When I was almost home, I ran into an old friend. She didn’t have a dog the last time I saw her, months ago, and now she does.

A lot of pandemic life has been fine, really. I kind of like being at home. I work just fine from my living room, and expect to continue doing so a few days a week, as I did before the pandemic. I’ve taken up a lot of hobbies. But I’ve also lost touch with a lot of the mundane sights and encounters that make up part of my connection to my community. It was refreshing to see them again.

Photo: Helen Fields, moments before meeting the dog