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SURVIVING THE PANDEMIC: Subject to change — welcome to the next incarnation of Head Butler
By
Published: May 06, 2020
Category:
Pandemic: Dispatches and Essentials
The image above is by Miles Hyman, a consistently excellent artist who lives in Paris. Decades ago, he created the Head Butler logo.
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Friends —
On March 1, Butler made a pivot from a 4-days-a-week cultural site to a 7-days-a-week service site.
I had to look up the date. That long? Time blurs. I recall this: it felt necessary for me to publish every day, because the incoming was fast and intense and filled with lies and I wanted to have an ongoing record. And more: I wanted to offer product suggestions and accurate medical information so we’d be an intact community on the other side of the plague. Many of you found the daily Butler necessary reading — an affirmation of sanity from a virtual friend whose thoughts and fears mirrored yours. You wrote to cheer me on, and I am so grateful for your emails. I tried to answer them all. I surely failed.
Time now for another pivot.
One reason is personal: I’m not sick, but I am exhausted. I need to rest more and walk more and annoy my daughter more and work on my book, and there’s some other stuff you can probably guess at.
The other is political: The pandemic is over. That’s the official word, anyway. The White House Task Force, which accomplished nothing, is being disbanded — “like taking a victory lap in the fourth inning,” someone said. We’ll open the country, and we won’t look back, even if there’s a fresh spike and the virus burns the country crisp. Because someone must be re-elected.
Yesterday, the President traveled to Arizona. He stepped off the plane unmasked, shook hands, and toured a Honeywell plant. Despite clear signage, he wore only safety goggles. Music from his standard campaign rally soundtrack played over loudspeakers, including “Live and Let Die.” His message was a reaffirmation of his back-to-work-at-all-costs obsession: “Will some people be affected? Yes. Will some people be affected badly? Yes. But we have to get our country open and we have to get it open soon.”
And with that, I hope, endeth Butler’s reporting on this man.
I pray my daughter gets to college in the fall and has the experience of a kegger interrupted by classes, but I have no predictive ability. I saw a photo, surely doctored, of the Rolling Stones. They’re all wearing masks — except for Keith Richards. The caption: “The virus is afraid of Keith.” If only. The sad truth is that the virus is afraid of no one. As I have written, in this Bible story, we are all Egyptians. I fear those of us who can be at home will be home for quite a while. Those hair thinning scissors I recommended to you weeks ago? I bought them yesterday.
Butler’s next pivot: a 4-to-5-times-a-week aerobics program for the brain and soul. The “covid fog” –– mental weariness and confusion — is my enemy. I may need to look inward and reflect; I’ll do that privately. Here, not at great length, I want to serve a double-shot of energy, intelligence, compassion and motivation without the woo-woo rhetoric.
Start with this, for kids and big kids alike: Daniel Radcliffe reads Chapter 1 of the first Harry Potter book. (In weeks to come, others will follow; this should end in summer.)
And then, in the New Yorker, This is What Happens to People Under Stress: an interview with Esther Perel The last paragraph jumped out at me:
“Go from the ‘I and you’ to the ‘we.’ What is this doing to us? What does ‘us’ need at this moment?” If you can think about that third entity called the relationship, and do certain things because the relationship needs it, even if it’s not what you need, that will give you a very hopeful framework.”
Finally, this song is in heavy rotation here. A littly goopy, but it’s Jackson Browne, shortly before he was visited by the virus. It’s “A Little Too Soon to Tell.” I commend all the lyrics, but especially these. As radio DJs used to say, I send this out to the lifeboat kids. If that’s also you… grab an oar.
Searchin’ the horizon
For what we hope to see
When all we’ve ever needed
Has been there all along
Inside of you and me
I wanna see you holdin’ out your light
I wanna see you light the way
Beyond the sirens in the broken night
Beyond the sickness of our day
And after all we’ve come to live with
I wanna know if you’re okay
I wanna think it’s gonna be alright
It’s just a little soon to say
ESSENTIALS AND DISPATCHES
Everything, all in one place.
UPDATE: EO Hand Soap is available again.
UPDATE: I spoke with a NYC lung specialist. He endorses Vitamin D, but warns you not to double/triple dose. In large doses, Vitamin D becomes toxic.
