Tuesday, March 31, 2020

In 2020, several thousand migrant farmworkers across California marked the birth of the great César Chávez by bending to the earth in fields from Imperial County to Crescent City for 10 hours or more, harvesting oranges, strawberries, cabbage, carrots, beets, and a dizzying assortment of fruits, vegetables and nuts like they do every day, while a global pandemic locked down entire cities and towns all around them, offering few choices but to keep bending.

My wife said the grocery store felt completely different this morning than 10 days ago, as masked and gloved people shuffled six feet or more apart from aisle to aisle, avoiding eye contact, following shopping lists, keeping quiet, distancing.

I spent the day mostly indoors behind darkened shades, thinking, daydreaming, wandering inside my own mind, as spring unfurled on central California in a burst like its usual annual celebration of ozone, pollen, color, light.