Day 131

Somehow it is nearing the end of July. It doesn’t feel like any other summer. Everything feels slightly off, like milk on the verge of spoiling. How many more bowls of cereal can we get out of that gallon before we have to make pancakes from it, or pour it down the drain altogether?

That’s how I feel. And I don’t want cereal. Or pancakes. Or the waste of a gallon of milk down the drain.

Here is what makes today, today:

• I bought chocolate-chip cookie sandwiches for dessert, aka Chipwiches back in the day. A treat, and one that everyone was excited about. As I put them in the cart I thought they looked pretty good. The kids tore into the package after dinner and revealed these tiny cookies with barely a smear of vanilla ice cream between them. At least they tasted good, as reported by the four others in my family who examined their tiny cookie sandwiches and then devoured them in no time.

• I ordered some new clothes a while ago, and they arrived today. What I really wanted was a few pairs of comfortable shorts that fit. This is the second time I will be returning an order of a failed shorts purchase. I did get some new jammies, though, and they fit and are comfy. I will try not to wear them to work.

• Both of the above items do make today today, but so does the fact that there were more than 1,000 deaths from Covid-19. Today. In one day. In this country. A doctor on the news described it this way: Many of these deaths were premature. Unnecessary. Preventable.

• It’s all devastating. We will eat our chipwiches. I will return my uncomfortable shorts.

• Other things: Every Wednesday night I get an alert that my ballet class is coming up at 6:30 p.m. Except, of course, no ballet class right now. But I keep it on my calendar. And every week I have a moment of sadness. Ballet is as much a mental health activity for me as a physical activity. I have not been to class since February, I think. Maybe early March.

• We had severe thunderstorms a little while ago. Not long after I had returned from the store. The refrigerator and freezer are stocked. I did not want to think about spoiled food, milk or otherwise. I told the kids not to open the fridge and stand in front of it taking inventory but to know what they were after before they opened the doors. We located the camping lanterns, flashlights and head lamps. The power came on again.

• The kids played ladder ball this afternoon. I wasn’t home, but I think I heard my son say he was “four and oh.” And then he tried to challenge me to a game tomorrow. Maybe.

• I worked.

• I folded laundry, and I did the dishes at least three times. (What counts as one time, really? A sink full of dirty dishes? The need to unload and/or load the dishwasher? All of the above? AT LEAST three times. Today. And the sink is full again.)

Some days I want to write because I feel I have something to say. A narrative takes hold in my brain at some point during the day, but I can’t get here to jot it down. Or, I do jot it down, and it stays as a draft, unfinished. I was interrupted or ran out of time or lost confidence.

Tonight I am writing with the sole intent to try to mark this particular day, in part for its absolute — and newish — normalcy, I think, and in part because of the spoiled-milk feeling. I feel uncomfortable and inarticulate and cranky. I’m tired and sweaty, and all I want is to be alone. That’s not an option in the moment, and so here I sit with the sound of white noise blasting in my ears, trying to drown out the noise of a basketball game in the other room. I should be grateful for that sound, the familiarity of sports on TV, and my kids watching with excitement, wearing the jerseys of their favorite players. But what I want is quiet, solitude, to be left alone to be grumpy if I want to be.

Instead, I’m going to start my 59th book of the year, On the Come Up by Angie Thomas. I bought it last Tuesday. Each of my daughters read it in three days. I’m next. I told them I’d be done by Friday, keeping to that three-day time frame.

More than 15 million people have contracted this disease worldwide. The total in the United States is just below 4 million. I read yesterday that some scientists estimate that the true number of cases could be 10 times that. Deaths in the U.S. total just under 150,000.

Stay safe, everyone.