Black Swans; the Hurt of Invisible Goodbyes: a 2020 Quarantine Reflection

Friday, March sixth: my birthday has just passed. I celebrate my eighteenth trip around the sun with cookie-cake and a surprise calculus exam. Jake and I pose with the cake, “Happy Birthday Ellis and Jake!” it reads; naïve joy creases into our smiles as the camera clicks. Here we are, together, celebrating our partnership and each other. Today is an ideal day.

Friday, March thirteenth: no more birthdays, yet another math exam accompanies the morning. I’m on autopilot the whole day. At the sound of the bell, I walk down my school’s three flights of stairs, through the main hallway, and out of the building. I do not look back. Why would I?

There is only before and after Friday the thirteenth. What an ironic date it is. After the thirteenth, McMaster appears on our TV to close school for the next month. Friends post pictures with #coronacation! Teachers frantically convert courses over to Google Classroom. For some reason, I feel calm. I tell myself COVID-19 is like Ebola; it will be kept at bay and quickly eliminated.

Email subjects start with big, fat letters reading “CANCELED.” My final orchestra concert, chamber strings recital, prom, and countless other monumental events disappear. With the cancellation of these events comes the evaporation of my calm. I read the CDC website; explore the data behind this mysterious disease. “My God,” I whisper to no one.

I stop listening to the news — it makes me confused. I stop playing cello — it makes me cry. My life jerks in awkward, disorienting directions. The simple, linear trajectory of my life rams into the pandemic and throws me completely off course. Our house becomes my life. I bake, I clean, and I cook. I repaint two bedrooms, redecorate the living room, and rearrange my bedroom. Domestic activities are the only pastimes I tolerate. I do not know why.

Now, in the midst of lockdown, I examine my cookie-cake picture once more; oh, how I want to go back to that day. I’m mad at the world right now, and I struggle to find gratitude for the ability, the privilege, my family has in staying home. I lie awake at night worrying about my high-risk father who lives with a congenital heart defect. I wake up early in the morning worrying about my grandparents who live far away.

My nine acceptance letters still come in, but how can I begin to think about college? I cry, I panic, I yell, I scream, I pace around my backyard, barefoot, at midnight. Enraged like never before, I shred my acceptance letters and watch the Tufts, Davidson, Northeastern, George Washington, UConn, Maryland, Furman, and Clemson emblems fall apart before my hot, teary eyes. South Carolina is my only option it seems.

I go to a virtual prom with a virtual Jake. I have online AP exams. I schedule Group FaceTime calls with my friends, yet I still feel horribly alone.

The week before graduation, my high school puts on a drive-thru parade for the seniors. My mom drives me through the carline, and I see my teachers one final time. I’m overcome with gratitude and grief for those fearless educators. Afterwards, I write elaborate thank you emails to my teachers, but it is not enough; I miss school more dearly than ever before.

I do not attend graduation; it’s not worth the risk of exposure. Instead, I graduate as a name, “Ellis Christine McLarty, Academic and High Honor.” From the dining room table, I watch my ghost walk across the stage.

The next date I remember is May twenty-sixth: Jake receives a call from an unknown number. I hear only fragments of what he calmly, carefully relays to me, “United States Military Academy — West Point. Twenty-four hours to decide. Leave July first for basic training. No communication until mid-August. Possibly on base until 2021. Opportunity I must take.” As I comprehend these words, I feel my world crumble once more. “Yes,” I say to him, “Yes! Of course, you should go!” I smile an effortful smile. We say our FaceTime goodbyes, and I run into my mother’s arms, sobbing. My life is a game of operation: how many parts can be extracted before I lose?

Slowly, I integrate news back into my diet only to be confronted with tragedy. I am unable to process the inequity our country faces. As I watch protests from the comfort of my home, I am disgusted by my privilege. I, a white woman, place my health and that of my family over the protesting for basic, civil liberates of my fellow Americans. I am heavily conflicted with my decision to stay home instead of protesting, but I must remember my father; what the virus would do to him. I do what I can virtually, but it is not the same. I am disappointed in myself for my lack of involvement and I believe I always will be.

As Jake approaches his July departure, I beg time to slow, yet it does not comply. Before we can blink, our summer together is gone. The collective, innumerous goodbyes I’ve said in the past feel painless in comparison to this one. Mid-July, I spiral. In my journal, I write:

The more I look at myself, the more I see the underlying problems I’ve tried to ignore. My body has learned to suppress my anxiety by staying remarkably busy with school. During quarantine, I wasn’t great, but you [Jake] kept me afloat. I did not realize how much of my burden you were carrying — I am terribly sorry for that, Jake. With you gone, I feel like I’m drowning. I hate this version of myself.

The remainder of July and early August are filled with tears. Finally, through geographical relocation and reignition of routine, I am finding myself once again.

My Black Swans Summer is strung with a spiderweb of invisible goodbyes which entangles the closed chapter of my childhood. One day, I will reach through the web and free myself, but for now I look only ahead.