How are we spending our time during the shutdown?

We are so grateful that you’ve asked.

My wife, Amy, and I are spending more hours together, really together. We read to one another, sing out loud together (mostly 1980s favorites), and pray more often together.

We spend more time in the kitchen preparing meals — oops, I mean cuisine! We are creating extravagant new dishes out of leftovers. We never made jambalaya before, but with this last weekend’s chicken leftovers it has become a must-post COVID dish.

We live in a gated 55-and-over community. With Chuck who normally plays guitar and sings in nursing homes to pick up a few extra bucks, we gather in the lane outside Chuck’s place sing songs in all octaves known to nature (socially distanced of course) as our man strums from his front porch. We often even do the “Hokey Pokey”!

Our Democrat and Republican neighbors are once again smiling at one another and interacting civilly, and most of us agree that today there’s only one party in this crisis-addled nation — American. Last night we sang “I’m Proud to Be an American,” and more than a few tears were seen. Mine, too.

We thank more people who check our groceries, deliver our mail, and cut our grass. In fact, we have taken the time to get to know them as we stop and share these halcyon moments together.

I don’t think Amy and I will ever go back to the scarcely poignant helter-skelter pre-COVID life we were living. Perhaps that is God’s blessing amidst this crisis.

Again, thanks for asking!

Very respectfully,

Sam

—

Editor’s Note: The coronavirus pandemic has many of us shut up in our homes for now. That can be isolating and frustrating. But it can also be a chance to catch up on things we let fall away during busier times. So we’re asking our writers and readers: How are you spending your time amid the shutdown? We’re open to anything that will make us laugh or think and help us share what will be a difficult time for many. Please send contributions of 250–400 words to editor@spectator.org.