Shelter in Place, San Francisco, California
From over the fence the other day, my neighbor pointed to the tea roses on our side. “I just love the Cecil Brunner roses, don’t you? They’re such classics. They don’t look so good when they open up,” he said, “but their buds are just so perfect!” It’s true. I’ve been featuring these beauties here off and on since the first one bloomed, but my neighbor reminded me to look again. Right now, we’re in a waning stage, with more spent flowers than new blooms, but soon this old and gnarled bush will grace us with a fresh crop to last us through the summer.
Last Christmas, my two sons explained patiently to me and my twelve-year-old grandson the meaning of the phrase “Okay, Boomer” - my grandson because he had used it completely inappropriately, and me because I’d never heard it before. I’ve tried to avoid all the labels awarded my generation in the various decades since my birth - baby boomers, hippies, flower children, career moms, etc. - but I admit that we probably now deserve the “okay Boomer” reprimand when we lament the lost days of our youth. Do I know where this world is going? For the life of me, I do not. Do I miss the old days? Especially in politics, I do, crazy as it seems - when folks of all persuasions were expected to tell the truth and work for their respective versions of how to serve their country rather than themselves.
I admit that I’m feeling trepidation about the next phase of the quarantine when the rest of the world tries to reestablish some kind of ‘normal’ and us oldsters are advised to remain at home. I liked it when, as the sappiest of Covid-era advertisements claimed, we were all in this together. Now the aged among us will be even more out of the mainstream than we were before this started (and we were), with a new title hanging over our heads - ‘expendable.’ I’ve heard the word creep into the language of certain politicians and the sentiment emerge from behind the headlines. Somehow, the idea of staying home ‘to protect your grandmother’ has warped into a more cynical version of itself - it’s mostly old people dying, so what’s the big deal? I’m not going to argue the case, I’m going to tell you how it feels. Shitty. Strange. Demoralizing. I can’t say I haven’t thought from time to time about the native peoples whose elders accepted death gracefully for the good of the community. I’m not totally averse, in fact, to such a concept now - after all, at least part of the reason I stay home is to keep the hospitals from being overwhelmed with the likes of me. But I’m not convinced that those willing to let me go have the greater good in mind.
I am hoping with all my might that those younger than me will have the foresight and courage to take the unexpected opportunity this pandemic has offered up - a chance to do things differently - maybe radically so. I don’t want the old ways back - I want our offspring to fix things in a way that my generation never could. I want new life, new buds to bloom - fairness, equality, sustainability, compassion. And if that’s possible, you can bet this particular boomer will not only stay at home, she’ll shut up, and stay completely out of the way.