A week or so ago, before America began any sort of real response to the virus-that-must-not-be-named, I picked up a book I’ve carried around for nearly eight years titled, “We Took to the Woods.” Coincidental? Maybe. Ironic? Absolutely not. It’s an autobiographical, “adventure tale” written by Louise Dickinson Rich, who lived with her husband and son in the deep backwoods of Maine in the 1930’s. This book, along with its compatriot, “She Took to the Woods,” a biography written by Alice Arlen about the previously mentioned author, were gifts from a friend who herself lived by a river in rural Maine. Probably the most cherished things I have, besides my cats, and would grab in a fire, are books given as gifts with thoughtful inscriptions. Susan and I met in Bethel, Maine, when I worked for Outward Bound, guiding teens on multi-week canoe and backpacking expeditions. One popular route included a four mile portage which lead us right past Forest Lodge, where the family lived and the book takes place. So I know the place, can put the lakes and rivers to their names, can see the pond and the carry road, at least in summer.
I think its safe to say, that at some point most people have considered a life lived away from society whether by choice or the impending apocalypse. “If the world collapses, I’m heading for the woods,” you hear people say. I always laugh (internally) when I hear that, especially from people whose only experience “in the woods” is car camping. I believe the vast majority of us, myself included, do not have the skills or temperament to survive in the woods at least for any real length of time with an measure of comfort or meaning. If everyone “headed to the woods,” let’s face, it would just look like a major traffic jam.
I was going to go on about the book and tie is into our current situation; I was going to talk about resourcefulness about how we can really live on very little, like Louise and her family did. But reality came back around to burst the serene little place I had found myself in there for a glorious hour or so- in another time and world and frame of mind, as books and words on paper so wonderfully can do.
I got a call from the Idaho Statesman reporter following up on the article he wrote last week about how this effecting people service industry folks. I updated him on my situation and we discussed the unknowns like federal relief and temporary unemployment benefits. I spent some time connecting him with other people in the service industry to get their perspectives. In there somewhere, I got a text from my manager at Voicebox, asking if I had signed up for unemployment benefits and encouraging me to do so. This is where optimism fails me; I anticipate that office becoming severely overburdened very quickly and any payments I do receive not coming close to covering my costs of living as my income at Voicebox just barely did. But I started an application anyways, it seeming both the responsible and irresponsible thing to do. I needed my pay stubs but my login wasn’t working for that website so I called support and was on hold for what felt like ever. I hear someone banging and yelling outside my patio. It was my neighbor Tracy sweeping and yelling “look out below!” She spent the next while telling me about her flea problem which has been going on for the past 5 months. “I have a PHD in fleas,” she said. It was one of those one-sided conversations where you start to notice the spittle at the corner of the other persons mouth and the details of their dental situation. There was no mention of the virus-that-shall-not-be-named and she seemed startlingly oblivious when I offered to pick up things for her from the grocery store. I have felt itchy since. I finished the application, microwaved an Amy’s Chinese Noodles in Cashew Cream sauce, plopped on the couch and attempted to watch Frozen 2 but all the singing annoyed me.
The conversation is a loud, confused, static, screaming mess and it feels overwhelming to be in it. I am suddenly struggling with the lack of middle ground, unable to find some footing in the world, confused with the people who seem to be carrying on as normal and find myself constantly hungry, desperate to get out of the kind of work the has put me in this situation and paranoid about fleas.
