In Like a Lion

This past month has turned our expectations upside down, coming in like a lamb and out like a lion. No, the lion hasn’t gone out yet, the experts tell us—hasn’t even arrived. We’re still on the upward slope of the curve and those roars you hear are still far in the distance.

Photo by Stefanos Kogkas on Unsplash

A month ago, my daughter Jessica was finishing midterms and spending every day with friends—so happy that all her besties were in the same residence hall this year. Now, four weeks later, she’s finishing out her semester alone in a dorm room, one of the few students remaining on campus. She picks up a boxed meal from the dining hall and brings it back to her room. She’s set to graduate in December but thinking about taking a semester off or a year off, so she can perhaps finish her last semester on campus rather than online.

Down in Albuquerque, Ashley is completing her final semester of college from the kitchen table of her off-campus rental. She graduates in May. The ceremony has been canceled, but Todd and I are still holding onto our flight tickets, just in case. Last week, New Mexico asked that anyone coming from out-of-state isolate for 14 days, which doesn’t make a 5-day visit at all realistic. I tell Ashley I haven’t changed our flights yet. She says, good, she doesn’t want us to cancel. I say if we can’t come in May, we will come another time. That’s good, she says. We both know that nothing is certain, despite our pretense that all might go according to plan after all.

Last Friday, when I was in the middle of texting Jessica, Ashley called. 

“Hey,” I said. “Some timing! I was just texting with your—” 

“Mom,” she said, and at her tone I immediately got scared. She was crying. I thought first of her boyfriend, Mitch, an ER paramedic. Had he gotten sick or hurt?

“Crow Canyon called,” Ashley said through her tears, and I knew Mitch was okay, but my heart sank just the same. “They said they would have loved to hire me but … they’re not running programs this summer.”

“Oh, Ashley,” I said. 

Back in high school, she had applied for a scholarship to Crow Canyon’s teen archaeology camp. She’d been accepted for the camp but not offered a scholarship. We couldn’t afford to send her. 

Photo by Meritt Thomas on Unsplash

When she applied for the graduate internship at Crow Canyon this past spring, I saw the possibility of literary symbolism: the internship would be a fitting bookend to her college years—a symbol of her resilience, of finding another way through even when the path seemed completely blocked off. The literary symbolism is still there, framing Ashley’s college years with a tangible disappointment, though not a lasting grief, I think. 

Earlier this semester, Ashley organized her CV and started applying for National Park internships. She’s had two interviews since the middle of March. Then, this past week, an email from one and a phone call from the other: Not hiring after all. Closed for they don’t know how long. 

Ashley doesn’t know what’s next. The customary advice one might give a college senior is unreasonable for this season. I told her I was so sorry and that this was a hard season to be finishing college. 

“I don’t know if anyone will be hiring,” Ashley said, no longer crying. Perhaps archaeological field work will still move forward even if sites are closed to the public. “I’ll check into that,” she said. “But not today.” We said goodbye and a while later she texted me the photo of her meal—a bowl of noodles in broth, topped with broccoli and a soft-boiled egg, halved. Comfort food for a world traveler who’s now stuck at home? Maybe. She’s taking care of herself as best she can. 

Photo (and food) by Ashley Harris

Three days pass. Ashley sends a picture of a round loaf of sourdough bread. She’s baking almost every day now, trying things she hasn’t had time for with work and classes and volunteering. Homemade black bean burgers on homemade sourdough buns. Her favorite breakfast bread from Morocco, mssemen. Dinner to share with Mitch when he comes home from a long shift at the hospital. 

The roommates have made a plan for when one of them gets sick. They know who will isolate where, with a different plan depending on who gets sick first. With two out of the four working in hospitals, they assume when rather than if. Ashley’s thinking about volunteering to support first responders by pet-sitting and getting groceries—if there’s a need within walking distance. There’s still money in her bank account, and the museum is letting her work from home for now. Life during the pandemic is oddly peaceful, even restorative. No one in the house is sick. Yet.

The lion paces, stalks outside. Ashley washes her hands, pulls up a recipe on her phone, scoops out some starter for today’s bread.