I was chatting with someone recently who mentioned feeling a little more tenderness and appreciation than usual right now. I could relate; I’ve been feeling the same way. I can think of a few other times in my life when I had this persistent sensation of tenderness, punctuated by moments of downright weepiness. One was my last six months months in D.C,. before I came home to New York for a fresh start. Another was last winter and spring, right after I’d wrapped…

I’m not sure whether I’ve ever mentioned this, but I can be amazingly visually unobservant. When I’m walking around here in NYC, I’m conscious of things like cars and the foot traffic of other pedestrians, but I don’t frequently notice things like architecture or foliage. I’ve become aware of this trait only by noting how different my orientation is from that of other people. My mom, for example, sees everything, from the shapes cast by shadows on the sidewalk to each and every…

On Wednesday, I learned that John Prine had passed away from complications of the coronavirus. A couple hours later, I sat down to read Gabriella Paiella’s raw and heartfelt tribute, “When I Get to Heaven” playing on my speakers. And I had a good, long cry. I’m not the most knowledgeable of fans, and I never saw Prine perform live. But I’m the un-casual fan that Paiella describes in her article in that my memories of Prine’s music are all personal and profoundly…

I’ve had a very quiet Sunday. Just me, a batch of tofu scramble, a socially distanced walk in the park, and the sound of birds chirping outside my open window. Because spring is arriving, quarantine or no. I’m not one to force myself to see silver linings in everything. Some things that happen really do strike me as senseless. But no matter what happens, to me or around me, I ask myself whether there’s anything that I can learn. Right now, quarantine is…