Shelter in Place, San Francisco, California
Bougainvillea is a wild, rambunctious vine that dominates a garden once it blooms. I love the two we planted side by side. They’re the perfect backdrop against our neighbor’s yellow wall, though several mysteries remain unanswered: 1) why do ours lose their leaves in winter when I see other Bougainvillea in the neighborhood keep their color year-round? The thorny vine is a bit of an eyesore without its leaves; 2) Why does one of our vines bloom six week later than the other, when they’re growing within two feet of each other and were planted the same day? and 3) most mysterious and existential of all - how does such a wild display of color have, actually, such tiny flowers you could be excused for not noticing? The bougainvillea flower, in fact, is the little, dainty white spot inside an ebullient nest of red leaves and stems - a quiet mystery amidst the noise (the colorful diagram of a COVID cell, by the way, reminds me a lot of our bougainvillea photographed like this, up close).
There is little mystery in our quotidian lives as our quarantine continues: Wake up, read the news, do a puzzle, plan dinner, then get out of bed for coffee and toast; grab the camera, visit the garden, sit in the sun and write, read more news online, scrounge a lunch, walk or read a book or stare at the jigsaw, write get-out-the-vote postcards, call a friend; then as evening descends, watch the news, cook dinner and enjoy it, settle down for one of a long rotation of TV series we have going on a list, check the news (again) online, and head for bed to read or sleep. Little changes as the days go by.
Yet the whole reason we are here remains shrouded in mystery: How much do we even know about this virus we are studiously avoiding? How can we be sure that what we’re doing (and not) will keep us safe? What is going to happen next? So much is out of our control, so many questions remain unanswered, that it gets harder to avoid the most existential one of all - how much time do we have left? Death’s mystery, of course - the when and how of it - lurks somewhere in the shadows throughout our lives and some of us have brushed close enough already to be able to name the specter’s shape. But in these days where suspended lives and non-stop crisis have strangely melded to make us feel we’ve lost control, that question - the mystery of life and death - has become closer of late, a quiet companion in our nearly quiet room.