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Worry. . . Be Sad.

“You know what song needs a revival?”
I know I don’t need to answer, but I look at him to show I’m attending. 
“Bobby McFerrin’s 'Don’t worry, Be happy.' But it’s ‘Worry, Be sad.”
I continue looking at him as he begins to sing,
     "Did you say your mom is dead?
     Gotta tumor in your head? 
     Worry . . . be sad. . .
     Sitting in a car that’s parked
     Your mind goes somewhere really dark
     Worry. . .  Be sad. (Worry, be sad now)”
Inspired, I join in, 
     “Doo doo doo doo doo, doo da doo da doo doo doo (Worry) 
     doo da doo da doo da doo (Be Sad) 
     do da doda doo…"
Fr (speaking) "You just don’t know what’s going to happen. You don’t know.”
...
On January 23, shortly after the US confirmed its first case of Covid-19 just north of Seattle, Fr's brother-in-law texted us on his family's thread. 
Oh we were quite cavalier about the whole thing. His mother's concern was valid. Perhaps we should have shared her concern, as clearly none of us knew what this virus was, or how it was spreading. I, for one, had a concern level of zero. And then it started to spread. A month later, there was a confirmed case at Amazon and Fr was asked to work from home. A week later schools closed. Then non-essentials closed. And now we are here. While I miss the time when this was a bat-casserole joke, I realize that even on January 23, all of this was still was. All of it had already happened. 

The Tralfamadorians can look at all the different moments just that way we can look at a stretch of the Rocky Mountains, for instance. . . It is just an illusion we have here on Earth that one moment follows another one, like beads on a string. . . . " (Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-5).

Fr continues to sing and cook while other thoughts float vaguely through my head:
The world is in a bad condition in this particular moment, but perfectly fine in many other moments. "And so it is silly for people to cry." The joke of the bat casserole was always going to happen. And a pandemic was always going to happen. And there is another moment where there is no pandemic. And I perceive time as linear, so I am marching toward the moment where there is no pandemic. And it is closer now than it was on January 23rd. So it goes. 

“This pandemic is worldwide/
and you cannot go outside/
Worry. Be sad. 

There was no Step by Step tonight. 

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