I got this lovely video from Robin, my granddaughter, today, she and Emma just returned from the post office in Brooklyn where they sent me a hand sanitizer bottle, and a collage that Robin made for me, with turtle beads and other remarkable things.

I appreciate this, I think they are worried about me a bit down there, and they have plenty of troubles of their own in New York City. I appreciate them thinking of me.

I’m starting a new thing since Robin is at home for weeks, I’m going to start reading stories to her over the phone, on Facetime, or via Skype. I hope to do this four or five times a week from home, of course.

She said she was very excited about this,  and Emma seemed almost desperately happy about it, we’ll start it tomorrow and see how it goes.

Robin has an even shorter attention span than I do, it might be bumpy.

I was surprised when Emma said she had a sanitizer for me, her husband Jay seemed to see things coming and stocked up on toilet paper and sanitizer back in February when I had not yet heard of the coronavirus.

I’m not used to being worried about this way. One of my blog readers wrote on Facebook that she was so upset by what she thought was my cavalier attitude towards the virus that she had to stop reading the blog.

I wrote back to her, telling her that I appreciated her caring for me, but I felt that it was my job to worry about me, not hers. She needs to take care of herself.

I am sorry if I give out the impression that I am reckless and irresponsible, I think I do a pretty good job of taking care of myself.

My doctor says I take care of my diabetes better than anyone in her practice (my blood sugar numbers are those if a healthy 25-year-old), I make all of my appointments, keep track of my medications, take all of my pills, walk a mile or two every day the ground isn’t icy. My cardiologist think’s I’m doing well.

I did not grasp the dimensions or lethality of this Pandemic until shortly after our trip to the Bronx Zoo the first weekend of this month, eons ago, when the idea of sheltering in place and staying inside was just beginning to be broached.

It seemed a remote thing to me.

The zoo passed out sanitizer bottles, we all used them. I am so glad we went, it could be a long time before we get back. All of us are healthy and active, me, Maria, Emma, and Robin. So, I hear, are the penguins.

My open-heart surgery five years ago did not leave me with the feeling that I am invincible or beyond the range of the coronavirus. I do have authority issues and don’t like being told what to do (or write). I am suspicious of politicians and their posturing, and for good reason, it turns out.

I instantly stopped socializing, going to lunch,  being in large crowds. I did go to Jean’s Place every day to support them and went shopping in my usual supermarkets. Maria began to be upset about the clear risk the coronavirus was to me and I felt it was my responsibility to take that worry seriously and stay indoors for as long as it was recommended.

A turning point for me was seeing Dr. Anthony Fauci of the CDC on television. I met him and wrote about him when I was a reporter covering the early days of the AIDS disaster. He was heroic then also.

He impressed me as an honest and experienced scientist who knew what he was talking about and wouldn’t lie for anybody, which put him in line for the worst job in America.

But I believed every word he said. I was also impressed with my governor, Andrew Cuomo. With these two in my sights and browser daily, I began to closely pay attention and began learning about the virus and what it could really do, and I began to see what I should really do.

I bristled at the idea that I couldn’t go outside, but that turns out not to be true.

I can walk anywhere I want, as long as I stay well away from other people. And frankly, I’ve always done that. I love being alone, and I love walking alone. I also don’t have a lot of friends, so this wasn’t a big sacrifice for me.

Zinnia is a swell companion for me, so is my wife.

Maria was in a complex position. She had to be careful where she went in order to not infect me, she also worried that I was still taking chances. As the days went on, I had great people to listen to – Dr. Fauci, Governor Cuomo,  Sue Silverstein of  Bishop Maginn High School, a friend and a teacher there,  and Maria.

And I did listen to them.

Pretty quickly, I was getting the same message from all of them, one night Maria and Sue boxed me in – Maria at the dinner table, Sue on her cell – and they told me the same thing I was hearing from the others:

this was serious, it was dangerous, and I need to really follow the expert’s recommendations, especially since I could harm someone else as well as myself.

I got it.

I have no quarrel with that.

So I am taking care of myself, with the help of a loving partner. I stopped going to Jean’s Place and the supermarket, the post office or inside the bank.

I call Maria Governor Wulf (“guv” for short) and am permitted to drive her if she’s in a good mood, although the car, the steering wheel, her hands, and mine get repeated rubs on sanitized wipes.

I do my Mansion and Bishop Maginn work on the phone, and it is working well. I order pizzas, plan meals, rouse support for Jean’s Place, buy computers, masks and raise money for food for hungry people.

That is a full plate, and I don’t need to roam around my town or anywhere else to do it.

We shop at our excellent food co-op (I am no longer permitted to wash their laundry once a week), or I should say Maria now shops at our excellent co-op. I am like the Phantom Of the Opera, not as exotic or dashing, felt and heard but never seen.

I roam the tunnels and passages of Bedlam Farm and am whispered about.

I’m friends with Cheyenne, the pizza person at Clark’s Pizza. We talk daily, and the campaign to get special meals to the Mansion aides and residents,  grocery gift cards to the increasingly vulnerable students and families at Bishop Maginn is going well.

I actually love the idea that I am doing a ton of good and being responsible at the same time.

I am not giving up my independence, nor am I leaving Amazon packages outside for 24 hours. I can find no reputable person or study anywhere who says that is necessary or helpful. I have always washed vegetables from the market and still do.

There is absolutely no way to sanitize all the mail and everything inside of it. The best thing I can do is wash my hands a lot, and we do have a shelf full of country-made soap.

Otherwise, I’m a model high-risk old man with underlying conditions.

I accept my responsibility to take care of myself, but I don’t need other people to mother me or take on worrying for me. That reminds me of my mother. I had a mother who worried about me too much and that didn’t work out well for anyone.

I get snarky with friends to send me messages like “please be safe.” Of course, I will try to be safe, I don’t need pleading. Is that curmudgeonly, or just honesty? I never liked being mothered.

I recognize that the morality of this virus is complex, and we do not have the luxury of just worrying about ourselves.

But I am still my responsibility, and one of the core moral obligations I recognize is taking care of myself and the people who love me.

Maria is much happier and more at ease since I confined myself to the farmhouse. I feel good about that.

And my daughter is glad to help me. The only sanitizer lotion I have is from China, all the lettering is Chinese, it’s three inches high, cost $7 on Amazon, and is nearly empty.

So I am looking forward to the sanitizer bottle my daughter is sending me, and the colorful collage Robin has made for me.