In Times of Coronavirus, there are travel bubbles that may or may not work because of their large size. Only time will tell. However, there are smaller more viable bubbles such as support bubbles and family bubbles.
In the UK, for example, support bubbles have replaced the infamous sex ban (4 June, www.timesofcoronavirus.com). As of Saturday, the British can once again enjoy carnal knowledge of each other even if they do not live under the same roof. Boris Johnson, who is a serial philanderer, now allows partners living in separate households to meet up without social distancing… probably because they would have done so anyway.
The choice of “support bubble”, however, is a momentous decision since members will be treated as one household, which means that adults cannot continuously chop and change whom they decide to visit.
In Spain, instead of support bubbles, there are family bubbles, which now in Phase 3, have expanded to include adult children and grandchildren, not living under the same roof. Given this new relaxed context, Mara (age 5), Hugo’s sister, decided that she was finally ready for her first sleepover.
This was a solemn occasion because she had never slept over at another house before, though she had been thinking about it for some time. Before taking this step, however, she had to weigh all of the advantages and disadvantages. She decided that Granny’s house would be the best place to start because (1) her brother had just spent the night there; (2) she could sleep on the top bunk bed; (3) her mother was close enough to come and get her if she repented of her decision.
So, yesterday evening, she appeared, carrying a pink unicorn knapsack that contained slippers, underwear, pyjamas, and a toothbrush. She also brought a rather worn stuffed rabbit with chewed-up ears, rejoicing in the name of Bunny. Bunny, the ultimate sleeping pill, has been the guardian of her dreams and nightmares since she was born.
Mara is a sprite, who came into the world prematurely and had to spend the first few weeks of her life gazing at the world from the hospital incubator. After she was finally taken home, she spent most of her time eating and sleeping. Her uninterrupted nights could last as long as 13 hours. She is a premium member of Dreamland, and has rarely had a wakeful night.
As she grew, she remained sylph-like though with a prodigious appetite that belied her small size. She would sit at the table and eat anything that happened to be in view on the table surface, ranging from cooked shrimp to asparagus to watermelon. I have never seen anyone so little eat so much.
We thought that it was strange that Mara was unusually quiet and serious. She had a habit of gazing at the world around her as though trying to decide whether it was worth her time and effort. Nevertheless, even though she did not talk very much, she seemed to understand everything that was going on.
Most of her communication with others was through expressive gestures, facial expressions, and mimicking. This began to seem a bit odd until my daughter finally discovered that at least part of her silence stemmed from the fact that her ears were blocked, and this was affecting her hearing.
When the doctor finally drained the phlegm from her ear canals, the verbal floodgates suddenly opened and to quote a friend in Iowa, “another gabby woman was born”. Since then, she has not stopped talking.
She will undoubtedly grow up to be charmingly dominant and assertive since she now spends a great deal of time telling everyone what they should do and trying to channel their interests towards some goal-directed activity that she enjoys.
She is especially successful at enchanting all members of the male sex, who are disarmed by so much tiny feminine determination and helplessly surrender to her charms. She calls her stepfather “mi bizcochito” [my cupcake].
Her grandfather is one of her most devoted slaves. The two of them spend hours making strange figures out of PlayDoh, which only they can identify, and playing games with a deck of Peppa Pig cards. I suspect that the rules are re-invented each time they play, but both seem happy with the set-up because she always ends up winning.
Mara’s current mission seems to be to explain the world to anyone wishing to participate in her version of reality. She is quite knowledgeable about the coronavirus, and has adjusted quite well to the new rules. She needs very little encouragement to expound on the virtues of washing hands, and is aware that next year, she will be required to wear a mask if there is no vaccine.
When no human listeners are available, she gathers up all of the dolls in the household, sits them down in a row on the couch, and gives them classes on the virus or whatever occurs to her at the time. Fortunately, they are excellent listeners and never interrupt her.
Although the content of her courses may vary, the one constant feature in her teaching methodology is that she spends a lot of time scolding her students because it seems that their behavior leaves much to be desired.
The other day, she spent the morning grading the dolls’ homework, which they had apparently sent her on some scratch paper that her mother keeps around the house. She was quite unimpressed with their efforts and proceeded to fail almost as many as I used to fail in my first fire-and-sword years of teaching.
She is a non-conformist and delights in being different from everyone. Even when there is no good reason for wearing a costume, she often wears one. Despite the fact that her pro-feminist mother shudders at the mention of Disney princesses, she often goes outside dressed as Frozen Princess Elsa. She has a witch costume, which she occasionally wears as well (though never on Halloween). However, she especially enjoys going to school dressed as Batgirl. She likes the cape because it makes her feel empowered.
I admire Mara because she is absolutely fearless. Even when she is not wearing her batgirl cape, she wears it in her mind and is invincible. When she is with friends, she is the leader and decides what the others will do. In many ways, she is more courageous than her brother, who worries a great deal about what others will think of him. I have no idea what she will end up doing with her life, but it will be something unique.
The post-coronavirus world will require people who are as intrepid as Mara is, people who are ready to take initiative when problems arise, people who are not afraid to lead. The virus is not going to disappear so easily. Even if one day it is eradicated because of a vaccine, there will be other viruses, and we will have to learn how to live with them as well.
Then it will be a good thing to be strong and unafraid. All of us will have to learn how to wear a cape, exactly like Mara.
