By Helen Nielsen
We knew their first names, our neighbors here in our Carlsbad condo complex with its great 180 degree view of the ocean, from the Power Plant south to Swami’s.
And they had a VW Van, the type I craved back in the early 1960s when going to the beach to surf, and for me living the “Gidget goes to Malibu” lifestyle was all the rage. But who knew their VW Van, which has eyebrows and eyelashes over the headlights, was called Apollonia after Prince’s girlfriend, and that she was from Santa Monica, CA and I was from Van Nuys. We both were L.A. regional soul mates.
Both sidelined by the restaurant closures I learned he was a chef at The Crack Shack in Little Italy and wrote recipes for healthy meals which got published. I wrote published healthy recipes too. She was a bartender at Jeune et Jolie in Carlsbad’s emerging North State Street “hipster area”. We love it there. Who knew?
Who knew my neighboring gardener at the Smerdu Community Garden in Carlsbad was a world renown Algae expert, who helps create those green lagoons you see on TV where the current major oil companies boast they are converting algae, even banana peels into Jet Fuel for the airplanes in our “green future.” We even had discussions about whether this was reality, or just some “Green Washing”, the equivalent of a “White Washing” PR campaign by oil companies to pretend they were actually doing something about the Global Healing Crisis which clearly has the potential to be much more catastrophic than Covid-19.
Or how the “how are you doing” messages I received from one of my divorced cousins in Denmark helped me think about transportation options. He lives in the suburbs and his ex-wife and two children live in the central city, who with no car could formerly navigate just fine using their super-efficient trolley and transit system. But now trolley riding is a dangerous crowded virus spreading proposition. So he gave her his car and now rides a Cargo Bike – it’s sort of the Pickup truck version of bicycles with luggage and carrying spaces behind the rider. He now loves biking the suburbs on his Electric Cargo Bike and says he never intends to go back to a car.
These are among the many examples of things I never would have known or asked about had I not been confined to standing apart and consciously trying to think about what I wanted to say through my face mask which constantly fogs my glasses and tickles my nose. I think when I talk and listen intently to what they say. Before, perhaps I was just chatting.
There are some good things that might come from experiencing this Pandemic. Let’s hope so.
