Are You Out There?

The other night, as Alicia Keys led Stephen Colbert through a brief meditation exercise on The Late Show, she told him to focus on something he wished for. "I want my studio audience back," he said and laughed. But you could tell he meant it.

How strange it must be to record the show in his own home, after years of doing shows with a live audience. I notice it too as I watch with my husband -- the empty silence after each punchline where the laughter should be. Quarantined in our living room, it's up to us to laugh. Or not.

Colbert's longing for an audience response? I totally get it. It's a familiar feeling for an aspiring writer. For any writer, really. We throw words onto a blank page, post them on a blog or publish them as articles or books, and HOPE they find a reader. Hope someone reads our words and feels better for having read them, or at least feels something. Anything.

When I decided to start blogging again, I told myself it was just for me. An outlet for the thoughts that parade through my head in every waking moment, occupying my writer's brain. Those thoughts that, if left unexpressed, set up camp and clog my creative channels. I told myself it didn't matter if anybody read or commented.

I lied. It does matter.

We all want -- need -- that connection to our readers. Even those of us who prefer to create in the quiet of a writing room or artist's studio. We want our art to resonate with someone. Anyone.

See me, writers and artists say in the subtext of every creation. This may not be my story, but it does reflect, on some deeper level, a part of who I am. Something I have felt, something you may have felt too. A piece of my soul reaching out to yours.

We count pageviews and look for comments. And we feel sad -- empty -- when our words seem to fall into a void. When our voice goes unheard. Unnoticed.

Still, writing is an act of faith. So we continue. We put words on the page and send them out into the world in search of an audience. In search of even one reader who will pause and read. In search of you.

Notes from a Pandemic: Day 6

Day 1 of our official lockdown in Maryland. Schools are closed for a couple of weeks -- likely more. Public gatherings of more than 50 are banned -- down from 250 a couple of days ago. Columbia Mall and movie theaters are temporarily shuttered (thank God there's still Netflix). But my husband and thousands of others are still at work. No, he is not a healthcare worker or a USPS employee.

Meanwhile, I got up this morning looking forward to a day of writing with no other obligations breathing down my neck and no stream of emails to distract me.

You know what they say about best laid plans, right?

My cat Mimi had other ideas of how we could spend the day. Or should I say her bladder and her chronic case of idiopathic cystitis had other ideas. It is 3:54 p.m. as I scrawl these words in my notebook, keenly aware that at any time she might get up and start to cycle again. A cycle goes somewhat like this:

• Go to litterbox 1.
• Go to litterbox 2.
• Go to litterbox 3.
• Strain to pee in each one. 
• Cover resulting one or two drops of pee.
• Go to back door; scratch and meow until staff lets you out.
• When door opens, go outside. 
• Two minutes later, if that, paw at the door to get back in.
• Go to front door; scratch and meow until staff lets you out.
• When invisible force field (translation: glass-paned storm door) goes down, pause and sniff the air. Contemplate whether to go out or stay in.

https://www.gocomics.com/brewsterrockit/2020/03/15

The two times I have dared to take my eyes off of her when she's been inside, she rewarded me by leaving bloody drops of urine on the white basement carpet, the clean-up of which demands either locking her in the back room of the basement with the litterboxes or tossing her back outside so as not to incur more collateral damage while taking care of the needed clean-up-on-aisle-6.

Those of you who have or have had small children or colicky babies can surely identify. Or perhaps I should say, I can now feel your pain. The only difference being that your little one will grow up and likely grow out of that phase, while the best we can hope for is to keep these incidents as few and far between as possible for the rest of Mimi's life, which could easily be another ten years or more, if she lives to the average cat age of 17 or 18.

I now know what you parents go through when the crying baby finally goes down for a nap and you are afraid to go about your normal business or tackle the house chores that have been stacking up while you tended to said crying, cranky, or sickly infant for fear that you will wake the proverbial Kraken. Fortunately for me, writing can be done without a lot of noise.

So, I will sit here on the living room floor, leaning against the buffet, notebook on my lap, and finish scribbling these thoughts while six feet away, my cat sleeps, belly up, under the dining room table for who knows how much longer.

And then I'll think about clever titles for the journal I'll be keeping throughout this pandemic to mark significant local and global developments as well as to track the more trivial personal struggles and triumphs that go with a life of seclusion while we wait out the coronavirus' threat and do our best to flatten its curve.

Stay safe and healthy, everyone. And remember, we're all in this together.