And now for something completely different...

I think I’m done with masks for awhile. Unless I promised you coverage for your face and have not yet delivered. Seriously. Let me know if you’ve been expecting PPE from Rose Valley and I haven’t made good on my offer yet. I’ve been letting things fall through cracks. Or maybe I’ve got my Teflon coat on and that’s why stuff seems to just bead and roll and not soak in. Or if you’re expecting a response from me and all you’re getting is crickets, please remind me. In the parlance of social media, I think this is called ghosting…when you drift into the background and don’t respond or reach back. I know I have been “Socially Distant.” Hunker is about the only posture that feels comfortable right now.

That’s not quite true. I thoroughly enjoyed the visit we had across the patio yesterday with one of our neighbors. Oh, and last week I actually dropped by a friend’s house without calling ahead. I intended to drop something off in the mailbox and then be on my way, but she was out planting her front flower beds. We stood at our separate ends of the driveway and gabbed for an hour. I fully acknowledge that I am ravenous for real time, face-to-face interactions with people I’m not married to. I mean, for heaven’s sake, Jack and I are all caught up.

I know. There’s Zoom. There’s Face Time. For which I’m grateful — to get to see my baby granddaughter take her first steps, for a way to share a fourth birthday with her sister. I kind of envy the industry and motivation of the storytellers I know who are not taking this pandemic lying down, who are up to their necks in the virtual stream of public performances. I’m kinda sorta dabbling a little bit in putting “The Teagan Show” up on my YouTube channel, for my older granddaughter. I’m resurrecting material I remember from preschool storytimes at the library. So far, I have two stories up, and production value is…not ready for prime time. Not by a long shot. Frankly, the thought of mastering the art of online streaming makes my teeth hurt.

We have much to be grateful for. We are well. We are well-fed. We are paid up for the month. Almost everything I have planted out in the yard looks happy to be there. The new bird feeders are attracting a steady clientele. Bluejays are bullies and boors, but you can’t blame them; it’s in their job description. A bumper crop of cardinals is flitting about the yard this spring, I think I can actually identify a nuthatch, and there are at least two adorable chipmunks on the premises. I might not have noticed them had we not been staying home.

The Hundred Pound No-Fly Zone

I have spent the better part of today trying to come up with a comfortable, secure, easy-on/easy-off/easy-on-again face mask that is: 1.) quick to construct, 2.) requires no, or minimal elastic, and 3.) supports a maximum load of significantly less than 100 pounds.

I had what I consider to be a brilliant design. Comfortable: check. Stays put: check. Easy to wear: check. Quick to make: check. Does not require elastic: check. BUT it fails the final criterion, and that’s a deal killer.

These masks I’m trying to figure out are going to a residential school where 25 of their students are sheltering in the only place they are allowed to be. Some of them can’t go “home” because “home” is where they got so messed up that there isn’t any other school that will take them. Some of them can’t shelter in place at home because their family has no home.

Despite the best efforts of the staff of this school, these kids are under-class citizens: under-served, under-nourished, under-educated, under surveillance, 24/7. For their personal protection during this lockdown — and hey, lockdown is nothing new to these kids — they’ve each been issued one cloth face mask, one size fits … most of them very poorly.

I was kind of excited when I learned that they really needed different masks. To think I could make a small but meaningful contribution! I got right on it and, BOOM! Here’s a great, doable, design. Except: It fastens with a slip knot at the end of a 30” cord. One of these kids has already tried to hang themselves with a scarf. So nothing I make that fastens around anybody’s head can be hefty enough to hold 100 pounds.

(There’s a 3-line poem somewhere in all of that.)