Through the Fog

Week three of the Bay Area’s “shelter in place” order, and still the occasional plane thrums overhead, its landing gear tilted toward SFO. My toddler will hear it first, soft cervine ears attuned to any small shift in sound. He signs for “airplane” with a swoop of his hand, and I wonder about all the empty seats up there, a ghost flight swooping in to find a region gone strangely quiet.

For those of us now painting blood over our door jambs and staying inside, this feels like a moment of suspended reality. As my partner began working at our bedroom desk in mid-March, switching her university courses to online learning, I had an ear on the news, nervous. The Grand Princess cruise ship was approaching San Francisco Bay with nearly two dozen positive COVID-19 cases and another 3,500 guests and crew needing quarantine. So I did a Target run and filled the trunk with groceries, just in case. The contagion is now everywhere but, at least for now, still...