Lise McClendon - STOP THE WORLD: Snapshots from a Pandemic: all profits go to charity

Copyrights belong to individual writers and artists. All rights reserved. Excerpts may be used with permission from the publisher. Printed in the USA.

2020, Thalia Press

Most illustrations are by United Nations Covid-19 Response Creative Content artists. Thank you all.

Title page illustration designed by pch.vector / Freepik

Front cover illustration by Zoe Phoenix, age 8.

2020, Zoe Phoenix

Illustrations by Kate Hourihan

2020, Kate Hourihan

Photographs thanks to generous photographers on Unsplash

2020 will go down as a year we are unlikely to forget. We have had many challenges this year, with more no doubt to come. But the COVID-19 pandemic that began at the end of 2019 and ravaged the world in 2020, killing countless people in every country, will be something we may want to forget. That was the genesis of this anthology. To record what we are likely to want to forget.

The idea came to me from two different sources. The first was a brainstorm I had early in 2019 for a worldwide happening on the same day, to simply share a meal with friends, family, neighbors, or strangers. To make a pot of pasta, some form of which is eaten everywhere, and share food with others. I called this idea One Night in the World and envisioned it as a coming together, a communion, a uniting when we feel and see so much division everywhere.

This idea, like many of mine, sounded amazing but one I had little energy or expertise to make a reality. So, after scribbling a short page of notes, I set it aside and went back to writing. When I was cleaning up my computer desktop this spring (as one does while sheltering-in-place) I reread it and thought: what if instead I did an anthology about the pandemic? Its happening globally (unlike pasta night.) It would distract me from the horrors and give this awful time some purpose. Again, I did nothing, as is my natural reaction to my brainstorms.

Then I listened to a podcast with writer Cheryl Strayed where she discussed this unsettling time with her former writing professor. He said he recommended to his graduate students that they record their emotions and thoughts about this time because someday they would want to remember how it felt to be alive right now.

The universe, by way of that podcast, had slapped me awake. The professor was whispering in my ear: DO THE ANTHOLOGY. That very day, (before my native laziness set in again) I reached out to my writer friends, Gary Phillips, Kate Flora, and Taffy Cannon, who had previously co-written a hilarious crime novel (as Thalia Filbert ) with Katy Munger and me. They immediately agreed to help.

This event, this horrible global pandemic, is obviously not humorous for patients nor the general public. The fear of disease, the lockdown, the economic woes were everywhere, as was the distraction of the news and whipsawing advice that wreaked havoc on many writers focus and production, as evidenced by their essays here. Others found solace in the wry darkness of fiction. Some were called to poetry. The range and class of these pieces inspire me, and give me hope. I hope they do the same for you.

As the Earth spins on its axis, sometimes it seemingly stops and makes us look hard at our lives. We will move on, if we can, but for just this moment, take a look at these snapshots in time.

Lise McClendon: June 2020

The first of the ants came the day Lockdown started. Just a couple, determinedly trekking across the kitchen. They were mostly invisible, camouflaged against the dark grey floor tiles and counter tops. I spotted them, though, and the finger of fate descended on them firmly. And that was it, until a couple of days later, when there were one or two more of them. They experienced exactly the same fate as the earlier raiding party, but no lessons were learned from their non-return to the colony.

Over the next few days they route-marched their way across my kitchen. My eyes became accustomed to the tiniest flicker of movement and ants and breadcrumbs met the same vicious index finger. Ironically, the ants arrived at a time when my kitchen had never been cleaner. Every time Ewan and I came back inside from this new world where an invisible enemy lurked, we bleached every surface, to keep us virus free. In addition, enforced home confinement and reduced ability to concentrate on anything meant that the cupboards had never been cleaner. I Sleeping-With-The-Enemy-ed the cans and packets of food and enclosed bags of sugar and jars of honey in sealable bags, cutting off the ants supply of hard drugs. My hands permanently smelled of bleach and the ants had nothing to feast on; yet still they came, blackly, relentlessly and optimistically.

I called to mind the few things I knew about ants: they can carry fifty times their own body weight, they survived the Ice Age, theyre extremely clever. Yes, all very impressive, chaps, but I had the internet. What makes ants I typed. Google suggested explode, mad, happy, so strong, go away. Dont get me wrong; in the normal way of things ants impress me. Their sense of community is amazing; they bury their dead; theyre ruled by a woman (although the fact that after sex she doesnt eat for weeks is a tad strange, especially since ants have two stomachs); and they can become zombies. Yes, theres a lot to admire about ants. But not when theyre in my house in ever-increasing numbers.

So I chose what makes ants go away. They dont like vinegar, I was assured. I filled a spray bottle with vinegar and water and sprayed all the skirting boards. I sprayed the counter tops, inside the cupboards, all over the cupboard doors. The trick, apparently, was to cover their tracks. They use their sense of smell to follow the pheromones of the ants whove boldly gone before. Google promised, but the ants continued to come. Turns out, the only beings in the house who were upset by the smell of vinegar were me and Ewan.