It’s October 2020, and temperatures have taken the usual nosedive from “At least it’s a dry heat” to “It gets cold in the desert?” I’m driving to The Writer’s Block, where crates of books are lined up by the door waiting for their new owners. Three of those books are waiting for me. The sign on the door asks me to put on a mask before walking in, and I do. The independent bookstore, one of famously few here in Vegas, is the one place I can’t seem to give up in the early pandemic days. I’ve given up restaurants, art galleries, coffee shops, all types of shops really. A bookstore is my line in the sand.
I’ve visited The Writer’s Block many more times since October 2020. It’s a safe place, somewhere I fit in. Although now, I don’t blend in. I’m one of maybe two people still wearing a mask. For most, the pandemic appears to be over. I wonder sometimes what that would feel like. Leaving the house as I did before. Do you remember before? I think I do. I lived in a city that I enjoyed exploring. I knew that D E Thai Kitchen was the best bang for your buck downtown. I wrote about the rise of New Orleans Square and the opening of The Mayfair Supper Club. I loved Las Vegas, and it felt like the city loved me too.
These days, leaving the house involves running a series of mathematical equations in my head, factoring probabilities, calculating risk versus reward. I hate math, but I have no choice. I’m 38 years old, and the number of times I’ve visited a doctor’s office this year is higher than most folks my age do in five years. For decades my body has been home to multiple chronic illnesses. They seem to enjoy it as much as I enjoyed Vegas.
These conditions have made my life progressively harder. I start my morning with five different pills meant to dissuade my body from acting on various natural but harmful impulses. It doesn’t always work. I may experience sudden sharp aches that derail productivity. The stress of that often triggers other painful symptoms in a biological domino effect. I scrape my efforts together, sapping every ounce of energy to make it to the end of the day—when I can drag myself to bed, sob into my pillow, and pray for relief. I feel like I’m on a dinghy, doing my best to stay afloat. Using my arms, legs, fingers, and toes to stop water from pouring in through the cracks. Doing every- thing I can to keep from drowning. There are no limbs left to seal any more leaks.
Meanwhile, COVID hospitalized my father. It killed a friend’s spouse. It settled into another friend and refuses to leave. The full extent and effects of long COVID are unknown. Doctors can’t predict who it will affect, and according to the recent federal Household Pulse Survey, it’s afflicting almost 1 in 5 adults who have had COVID. I know what it means to have everyday life disrupted by severe fatigue. To live with pain that lasts for years. Pain that is so alive you think it could go on without you. There’s no one I would wish that on.
So, I surprise even myself when I agree to meet friends for tea. It’s the beginning of 2022, and I can’t remember the last time I dined indoors. I’m recently boosted and highly optimistic. In addition to high tea, Coffee Religion has high ceilings and a large Buddha. The space is open and feels well ventilated. The server brings warm biscuits and soft, salty butter. She brings finger sandwiches, tiny toasts, and tarts lined up on tiers inside a golden cage. My friends and I talk. We laugh. We cry. I pour generous pools of cream into several cups of fragrant Earl Grey. Afterward, I waft home, buoyed by a balanced cocktail of good food, good service, good atmosphere, and good company. For an hour and a half, I put my fears aside. Then they return. I know this is not a pleasure I can regularly repeat. After all, I’m playing a numbers game, and the more often I take the risk, the more likely I am to regret it.
Those who have gone back to life as usual have done so while dismissing the phantom of chronic illness as if brushing biscuit crumbs off a table. That is a privilege that 65 percent of people are taking advantage of, according to the Axios-Ipsos Coronavirus Index. But the remaining 35 percent of us have had to find other ways to cope.
In the second half of 2021, I had begun my calculations in earnest. I realized there were occasions or locations that were nourishing enough to play the game of COVID roulette. Worthy of risking another crack in my dinghy. Fergusons Downtown, with its eclectic shops, quiet ease, and cascades of bougainvillea, was already a favorite of mine before the pandemic. It’s a type of locale Vegas needs more of — an outdoor public space with plenty of greenery, shade, seating, and no cars in sight. I added it to the rotation with The Writer’s Block.
None of my loved ones bristled at my preferences. They understood outdoor meals as the price of my attendance. They put on layers while braving the cold on Jjanga’s patio in Rhodes Ranch. They shooed flies away while we discussed the latest Twitter discourse at the tables outside Casa Don Juan Downtown. They wiped drizzle from the table while taking a bite of empanada at Makers & Finders in Summerlin. They put on sunglasses and chugged equal amounts of sangria and water on Firefly’s patio on Buffalo. For many, the pandemic has been both socially and financially isolating. I’m lucky that has not been the case for me.
The truth is that when it comes to COVID decisions, we’ve all done the math for our- selves, whether we realize it or not. We’ve allowed certain numbers to be acceptable, expendable. The nationwide seven-day average for deaths at press time is 390. It’s a difficult sum to fathom. An estimated 1,517 people died when the Titanic sank. We’re currently outpacing that number every month. Each one of those 390 represents someone who won’t wake up for breakfast. Someone who didn’t kiss a loved one at midnight on New Year’s Eve. Someone who will be missed.
There may be a day when I cross the threshold, when calculating my plans is no longer tenable. Until then, I will continue to do the small things I can to limit my risk and the risk of others who are more vulnerable. I still love this city. But I think it understands, I can’t love it in the same way as before. ✦