I’m sitting in my apartment at 3:30 on a Monday afternoon, March 23, 2020. My fellow Dallisites and myself have been coming to terms with a “shelter in place” frame of mind for over a week. The actual quarantine goes into effect tonight at midnight. Folks have barely begun to consider the effects and implications of long term isolation. During the last several days at home alone, I’ve become more aware than ever of sounds from the outside. Every sound, every door closing, music drifting from someone’s patio, muffled laughter on the other side of the wall, is a sound of life, a connection to the human race.
Then came the car horn.
At first, just like any car horn. But then it went on. And on. Extended. A long wailing horn. Then I had a thought. What if the next sound I heard was gunshots? It would not be the first time I’d heard gunshots in my east Dallas neighborhood. When I lived in Oak Cliff, it was common on a Saturday night. Even when I lived out in the country, gunshots were not unheard of. While they can be alarming enough anytime, under the current circumstances they would be even more likely to jangle the nerves. In this climate of fear and uncertainty, I thought, what if this is how it begins? How “The End” begins? A distant sound, fairly commonplace like a car horn, but somehow… off. A little different than usual. Then gunshots. Maybe a yell. The first sounds that signal the arrival of chaos. This is probably crazy, alarmist thinking. Like I said, the effects of long term isolation.
But empires have crumbled. I wonder, did those living in the heart of those empires feel the way we do now? Comfortable. Solid in our belief that life as we know it will go on. Even if things get topsy-turvy for a bit, it will all go back to business as usual eventually. Everything will settle down. But for those long, gone empires, there came a day when everything didn’t settle down. Things went from bad to worse to apocalypse. All history looks inevitable in retrospect. To us, the Mayan ruins have always been ruins. They were built and destined to be ruins. But to those who lived there during the best of times, it was home, and day to day mundane life rolled on until… something happened. History includes moments in time when certainty shifted to uncertainty. When the unthinkable became reality.
So what if the long, angry car horn was followed by gunshots. Then yelling. I would check to make sure the doors were locked. I would turn on local news to find out if something was happening. Maybe there would be a report about a little bit of civil unrest. The authorities are stepping up measures. Don’t worry. Shelter in place.
What if the previous day had been the last normal day of our lives?
I had to go to the grocery store last night. We were out of cheese. I was lucky to get one of the last blocks of cheddar left. The dairy shelves were well picked over, as were most of the other aisles. The store felt hollow and gaping under the florescent lights. A man was pushing his cart along, passing the empty milk shelves, head down and ranting, “Oh Lord, these are the times! The times were foretold! Oh God! Oh my God! You are almighty! This was foretold. Germs! It’s the germs! Germs! Almighty God!” He walked slowly, alone and ranting. Other shoppers kept their distance and avoided eye contact. No one working at the store tried to stop him or escort him out. He just continued on, walking the aisles and spreading his message of praise and doom.
It looked like a movie.
In moments like that I have those passing thoughts. What if this is a definitive moment of change. When certainty shifts to uncertainty. What if things don’t settle down. What if this is the beginning of a great falling apart?
Probably not. That’s crazy thinking. I’m already suffering the effects of long term isolation. And the quarantine is just beginning.