The first New York Times banner I read: NYC DEATH TOLL SOARS PAST 10,000 IN REVISED VIRUS COUNT.
The Boston Globe headlines are only marginally less anxiety-producing: CHELSEA’S SPIKE IN CORONAVIRUS CASES CHALLENGES HOSPITALS AND STATE; BOSTON SCIENTIFIC GETS OK TO MAKE A LOW-COST VENTILATOR.
I click on the link to the obituaries.
Couple married more than 75 years dies within hours of each other: After Ernest and Moira Goldblatt got married in the summer of 1942, they spent the rest of their lives together, right up until the very end. On April 10, the couple passed away at the Hillside Nursing Home in Waltham, less than two hours apart. Moira, 96, had recently tested positive for Covid-19. Ernest, 100, had been sick but his test for the disease was still outstanding. In an effort to reduce the spread of the virus, nursing home residents who were infected were transferred to a separate space. But there was no doubt that the Goldblatts would be staying together.
I click to turn the page and scan the names. I click again.
And again.
Again.
There are twenty-six pages of obituaries today in The Boston Globe.
With shaking hands, I close my computer.
There are already so many people who have lost someone, who’ll never receive another lopsided grin or smooth a cowlick or cry on a shoulder that smells like home. They’ll always see the empty seat at a wedding, a birthday, breakfast.
Why did I survive, when those they loved didn’t?
It’s not like I did anything right—I don’t even remember going to the hospital.
But it’s also not like they did anything wrong.
I feel a crushing sense that if I am here, there has to be an explanation. Because the alternative—that this virus is random, that anyone and everyone could die—is so overwhelming that it is hard to breathe.
Again.
I’m not conceited enough to think that I am special; I’m not religious enough to think I was spared by a higher power. I may not ever know why I’m still here and why the people in the rooms on either side of me at the hospital are not. But I can pivot on this point of the axis, and make sure whatever happens from here on in is worthy of this second chance I’ve been given.
I just don’t know what that looks like, exactly.
I reopen my computer, and type into Google: Jobs in art business.
A string of them pop onto my screen: Senior Business Development Manager, Artsy. Adjunct faculty, Institute of Art. Creative Director, Omni Health Corp. Art Director—Business Banking Division, JPMorgan Chase.
All look equally uninspiring.
I truly enjoyed my work at Sotheby’s. I loved the people I met and the art I helped sell.
Or at least that’s what I’d told myself.
I let my mind drift back to the last time I saw Kitomi and her painting.
If I got sick that night, and if asymptomatic people can spread the virus—could I have infected her?
Panicked, I look her up online. As far as I can tell, she is still alive and well in New York with her painting.
I remember how it felt to stand in the presence of that kind of artistic greatness. In front of that Toulouse-Lautrec, my fingers had itched for a brush, even though I was no Toulouse-Lautrec, no Van Gogh. I was a competent artist, but not a great one, and I knew it. Like my father, I could make a decent copy—but that’s different from creating an original masterpiece.
I had grown up in the shadow of my mother’s prize-winning photography. So instead of trying to create my own legacy—and failing—I reshaped my skill set to fit a field adjacent to art.
I erase one word in the search bar.
Jobs in art.
Fashion designer. Animator. Art teacher. Illustrator. Tattoo artist. Interior designer. Motion graphics designer. Art therapist.
Art therapy is the practice of incorporating visual art media to improve cognitive and sensory-motor function, self-esteem, and emotional coping skills for mental health treatment.
Immediately I am back on a beach in Isabela, making tiny dolls out of flotsam and jetsam and setting them in a sandcastle with Beatriz. I am writing our names on lava rocks and making them part of a standing wall. I am explaining to her why monks make beautiful mandalas and then brush the sand away.
I’ve already been thinking of another career, without even realizing it. I’ve practiced it, with Beatriz.
I rub my hand over my face. I imagine filling out an application for admission to a graduate program in art therapy, listing my imaginary experience in the field.
But maybe that’s the point. Maybe the Galápagos wasn’t something that happened, but something that is supposed to happen.