Even in a time of pandemic, life goes on. Here are stories from a community sheltered in place.
Tom: A lone turkey in search of a flock
I was sitting on our front steps when a large turkey, with his tail feathers fanned wide, appeared. I called out to Charles, “Look at that turkey, he looks different from other wild turkeys.” A lady jogged by, and the turkey began to follow her. Charles went after the turkey, thinking that it was going to attack the jogger. The turkey turned to follow Charles, and that began our week with Tom Turkey, as we referred to him.
The first night, Tom slept on our front porch railing. In the morning, he was on our back patio, where he remained, gobbling and drumming, watching us through the sliding glass door.
We thought it strange that Tom didn’t leave the patio to eat or drink. We wondered if he was a domestic turkey. His feathers were brown; wild turkeys are generally black.
Tom continued to follow Charles around the yard, as though Charles were the Pied Piper. He did not, however, befriend me. While I was clearing a flowerbed, Tom attacked me, pecking my nose and knocking me over. Charles grabbed him and locked him in the chicken coop. In the morning, Charles let him out, and soon Tom was back on our patio, gobbling and drumming.
By the fifth day, we had had enough. I suggested that we take Tom to the Oxbow in Still River. Charles didn’t want to be bothered. We built a barricade on our back patio. That didn’t keep Tom away. More drastic measures needed to be taken. We didn’t want to hurt the bird, just get rid of it. Charles grabbed Tom, took him across the street and put him in our small garage.
In the morning, having noticed two wild turkeys in our field, Charles let Tom out of the garage and led him toward the wild turkeys. Tom showed no interest in the other fowl and continued to follow Charles into the woods. The wild turkeys hurried off, and once they were well in the woods, Charles quickly returned to the house. Within minutes, Tom was back on our patio.
Finally, on Friday morning, eight days after Tom appeared, Charles captured Tom in a large trash barrel and we drove to the Oxbow. We thought this would be a wonderful place for a turkey. Imagine our surprise when we read in the Press that Tom had turned up at the Browses on Still River Road, been renamed Plymouth, and had proved to be as unwelcome there as he had been with us.
—Eileen and Charles Kronauer, Old Littleton Road
Fat tail
One night just after the first stay-at-home advisory, I woke up at 2 a.m. Out of habit I listened for the usual drone of traffic on Route 495. Always the pattern seeker, I used to fancy that the loudness predicted how much traffic there would be when I began my commute. This night all I could hear was the blood running through my veins and the electric current in my nerves. The nation was complying with similar advisories; maybe a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But it joined a number of extraordinary events I’ve witnessed this spring.
The week before, I had played one last squash game. To determine who would serve first, my weekly opponent of many years twirled his racket on its head and before it landed, I called, “Up.” Whenever he was the spinner, I always called “up.” We had noticed that in the last year, now that we thought about it, that the racket had almost always been landing “up.” It didn’t matter what racket we used or which player spun it. It didn’t matter which side of the court it was spun on. And we had had maybe over 500 matches, which made the run of “ups” a very rare event indeed—odds of one in many hundreds of thousands.
Earlier that week, my younger son suggested we discuss Benoît Mandelbrot’s book, “The (Mis)Behavior of Markets.” Having finished it, I emailed him to say I felt it was mistitled. Its thesis is that models are horrible at predicting stock market behavior, not about how stock markets misbehave. Almost as soon as I hit send, the stock market began its historic collapse, a true “black swan event.”
I had gone on to say that, of course, the unpredictability of “black swan events” and “once in a lifetime events” is what defines them. Not only is their timing unpredictable, but there are far more of them than any standard distribution would predict, thus the term “fat tail” to describe their distribution. Fractiles, which Mandelbrot headlines, are useless for predicting market behavior, so what was his point? Aren’t we condemned to project only patterns we recognize from our previous experience and, therefore, aren’t those predictions likely to fail in new circumstances?
By now, I am sure you, dear reader, share my son’s response to his father’s pontification.
Anxiety about the coronavirus isn’t surprising. We face an unfathomably large number of unpredictable existential threats, most of which we are blissfully ignorant of, thankfully. There may be no pattern we have the capacity to find. It’s good enough that we have the sound of blood in our ears and of electricity moving through our neurons.
—Jim Saalfield, Woodchuck Hill Road
Meeting in a virtual world
Problem: How can my monthly lunch group keep meeting in this time of social distancing?
Solution: The internet, of course!
But not so fast. We are all old, retired, lacking serious tech skills. We have an assortment of equipment, PCs, phones, tablets. And we tend to disagree a lot.
We all agree, however, that we need to keep interacting, especially now. No cancelations!
We started with a good old conference call. FreeConferenceCalls.com worked, but we found it was jammed. We learned to schedule calls at odd times, like 12:17 p.m. to avoid the rush. We still got busy signals. When we did all get on, it worked, but in the end it was just a conference call, something most of us gladly left behind when we retired.
During the call two people said they had used Zoom and it was easy. If you have not heard of Zoom, you really are distanced. High schools, colleges, and the government are all using it. A quick YouTube search turned up many tutorials. It runs on just about any smartphone or computer and is free for basic services. To be fair, I looked at the competition: Google Hangouts (requires a Google account—a deal-breaker), FaceTime (Apple only), Skype (probably OK but seemed dated), and a few others. Zoom is not perfect, but it got us going without losing momentum.
A few days later we did our first virtual get-together. It all worked. Success! Lessons learned: Don’t cancel—the next meeting is your deadline. Don’t spend too much time looking for the best. Go with what works and keep meeting!
— Edward Christiansen of Auburndale is a member of a Harvard reading group that met monthly in the General Store prior to the COVID-19 crisis.
Editor's Note: How are you coping with these unprecedented times? The Press wants to know. We’ll take care of the news; but we need your help to tell the human side of this crisis. Send us a photo with a caption or an anecdote (up to 250 words) about how you are getting through your days. What is bringing you comfort? What insights have you gained? What have been your greatest challenges and how have you overcome them? Your photos and stories, antidotes to isolation, will help bring us closer together in this time of social distancing. Send to editor@harvardpress.com with subject “stories” and include your name and address.
