Lockdown Log—Day 5

Killing Time During Covid

I awoke the next morning ready to establish some sort of routine to anchor the amorphous days that stretched out before me. Secure gainful employment! Study Spanish! Read books! Exercise! I looked out the window at the once bustling street below and saw, well…nothing. Occasionally a car sped by, but it was unsettlingly silent aside from the howling of a deranged man who, despite the strict rules, wandered the neighborhood daily around 4 pm. His mournful baying rang out like a vocalization of our collective angst, ratcheting up the sense of unease.

Why couldn’t this damn lockdown have happened a few months later, I thought in a fit of spectacular solipsism. I had barely secured a toehold in my new life and was now forced to put my hard-won progress on pause as I retreated into confinement. What was worse, I had no idea how long I’d have to hold on for.

In the four short months since I arrived in Barcelona, I felt a stirring of possibility that perhaps my hairbrained scheme of starting life over in Spain might work. I had found an apartment, sorted out my visa issues, learned to navigate the city, made some friends, signed up for Spanish classes, and met a man I was crazy about. Steady work still eluded me, a problem I knew would prove fatal if it continued. But I had made major strides, nevertheless. And now, just when I was gaining traction, I was stopped dead in my tracks.

The more I stewed, the more I felt the resolve and high spirits that initially energized me start to slip away. I promptly returned to bed where I could wallow more comfortably in my misery.

Mornings were my weak point. In true Spanish style, I started going to bed around midnight or later, and set my alarm for 9 am. With nothing specific to wake up for, why not sleep in? After the alarm roused me, there was the extended lie in. I could easily pass an hour or two reading emails, texts, the news, alarming Covid updates, social media. And pouf, the morning was gone.

Clearly, I also fell into this routine to unconsciously kill time so the rest of the day, spent alone with little on the agenda, wouldn’t loom quite as large. There were fewer hours to fill up by the time I pulled myself out of bed, slightly disgusted with myself at 11 am.

To stave off the creeping torpor, I needed to figure out some kind of exercise routine. My friend Dianne had begun running stairs in her building and I decided to do the same. My building had 12 steep flights and I settled into a circuit of seven trips up and down, huffing and puffing, followed by pushups, sit ups, and squats in my apartment.

With the start of lockdown, my building, which was mostly short-term rentals, quickly emptied out. Other than two local residents who had lived there most of their lives, I had the place to myself. I would occasionally bump into them as I made my sweaty, breathless way along my route. They were often returning from a trip to the grocery store, stuffing chips into their mouth as they ascended—mainlining comfort food along with the rest of the world. They would nod wordlessly and give me a wide berth, no doubt wondering what kind of madness made the foreigner subject herself to this strange torture.

The rest of the day I fielded calls from the US, where there was no lockdown. I fantasized about the freedom they enjoyed, living vicariously through details of dinners out, tennis matches, and weekend trips to Napa. It was heartening how many people back home were worried about me and despite my precarious circumstances, it buoyed me. At 6:30, my Spanish lessons commenced on Zoom. Still the clear loser in my class, I was grateful for the distraction and structure it provided.

Jaume called later to tell me his brother and sister-in-law, who we had dinner with the previous week, were sick, most likely with Covid. Their doctor told them there were no tests available and since their offices were overwhelmed, they should stay home and rest. At a time when the death rate was rapidly rising and the sound of ambulance sirens routinely filled the air, how could they tell patients to simply make do at home? I knew then how quickly the situation had deteriorated.

Once again, Jaume and I strategized how to see each other. He suggested I could take the metro to him and if the police stopped me, I would simply say I’m coming to do work as a translator for a lawyer with foreign clients. “Um, no thanks,” I said.

“I’m coming to see you in any case,” he replied. “I can’t tell you if it’s tomorrow or the next day, but I will.”