Last spring, as South Carolina went into lockdown because of COVID19, I was teaching a creative writing course. Many of my students found themselves back at home, but some stayed here, working. A couple worked for Instacart. One student took over the homeschooling of her little brothers, another started helping out in his family's liquor store (alcohol, like groceries, ruled essential).
And for a few of them, the disruptions of their daily lives began to appear in their creative writing assignments, in poems, in essays. Peyton was an essential worker, wait staff at a Columbia restaurant that continued to offer curbside takeaway. This little essay captures the anxieties of those moments, the precautions we took (and are still taking), the careful attention to our environment and to those around us. With her permission, we're posting this to our "Corona Times" series -- a moment in the pandemic captured with precision.
-Ed Madden
Jasper Magazine poetry editor
Peyton Nielson is originally from the Chicago Suburbs, 21 years old, and a senior Public Health major at USC.
(photo courtesy of the author)
Essential
by Peyton Nielsen
lockdown, spring 2020
Twice a week each week, she gets a treat: to not spend every waking moment in the confines of the four walls of her townhome. Usually, waking up for work is a chore. But now she practically leaps out of the shackles of her bed and into the bathroom to put on makeup and look nice. It has been a while since she has brushed her hair. She cuts the chains off the door, skips to her car, which sits idle most of the time these days. The drive is the best part: windows down, sun hitting her left thigh, melodies bouncing around the car. It’s hard not to sing at full volume even if others look over. She sounds bad, but she feels free.
*
The chairs and stools are put up on the tables, only half of the restaurant is lit, and the bar is blocked off. Usually there are multiple coworkers setting up, cooking, cleaning the restaurant. This time, it is just her and her manager, who now works in the kitchen too, and in a pinch is the occasional dish washer. She picks up a pair of extra-large flour-dusted gloves – that’s all they have here – and wraps rubber bands on her wrists so they stay on. She sprays down every surface, prepares the to-go bags, and hangs up signs on the doors so people stay on the curbside. No one is allowed in anymore. But this is her temporary paradise from the stir-crazy she feels the other five days. This is the treat she gets, as long as everyone keeps their hands to themselves, coughs in the other direction (preferably into their elbows, but that is wishful thinking sometimes), and has prepaid online so she does not have to touch cash or a credit card.
*
The sunlight has slipped below the windowsills and into the ground, and she begins to count her tip jar out (with gloves on of course). She lays out each dollar denomination in their respective values and counts it out for herself: part of rent, light bill, water, groceries, and some money to help pay off the new shoes she bought before the shift cuts and layoffs. A decent shift – people are kinder these days. She immediately goes to wash her hands for the umpteenth time. Her hands are dry and beginning to crack from the hot water, soap, the flour from the gloves. She will remember lotion next time.
*
There isn’t any music on the drive home. She calls her mom, so her mom won’t have to call later at two in the morning in a panic wondering if her girl made it home safe. They talk about nothing really. There is nothing to talk about. The windows are up, it’s stuffy, and her work shoes are starting to make the seats smell. She won’t bring them inside when she gets home, that’s probably unsafe. The car is put back into park for another week and is Clorox-wiped before she locks it up.
*
Immediately the clothes are off and in a separate laundry bin to be safe, and she climbs into the shower. Her shins hurt from standing for twelve hours. The arches of her feet ache, and anxiety makes her chest tight, but at least she can pay her rent tomorrow. She dries off and starts over the two-week time clock to make sure no symptoms arise so that she can continue to go to work. She is young, she’ll probably be fine, right? That’s not what CNN said last night, maybe she should quit. At three in the morning, sleep finally finds her. The hum of her oil diffuser replaces the diminished white noise outside.