Items

• 
  -0021-06-29

  Deli Smells and Sounds

  This story tells of the dramatic shift in "normalcy" that the pandemic interrupted.
• 
  2020-10-14

  Time to Cook

  Before the onset of the corona virus and the lockdowns and quarantines that followed, I had a pretty routine schedule. I would wake up around 7:15am and I would not get home again until about 7pm. Normally I would make something easy for dinner that I could have at least another night in a row. Usually it would just be a meat and a vegetable with fruit for dessert. I would cook the vegetables and the meat in the same pan to save myself the clean up time later as I would normally go to bed around 11pm and not want to waste any more time cleaning than I had to. I also would not stray too far from recipes that I was comfortable with. I would be very upset if I made something terrible after a ling day at work. However now with quarantine, I work from home and my schedule has become quite different. I am able to sleep in a little longer as I do not have to commute anymore. As soon as I am finished work I am already home and can start making dinner as soon as I want. This extra time gives me more flexibility to try new recipes and take chances on foods I may not have tried otherwise. On my lunch break I am able to go food shopping so I am not limited by what ingredients I have on hand. For this meal that I made and posted pictures of, it would be a rare treat to get this on a worknight before COVID-19. This meal took longer, used more ingredients, involved more pots and pans, and took longer to clean up than any pre-quarantine meal that I would make. Yet the payoff was absolutely delicious. To have pan seared scallops in a creamy garlic sauce over wheat spaghetti on a random Wednesday night is one of the few bright sides of quarantine. I am looking forward to the day when all restrictions are lifted and life returns to normal but I will surely miss all the extra time I have to try new recipes, to have my kitchen filled with new and unique scents and for my taste buds to experience diverse ranges of cuisines that my normal schedule precluded.
• 
  2020-02-06

  Hospital Sensory Experience

  This experience of the Covid-19 pandemic is probably very different than most people. My picture submitted of myself shows a selfie that I took while in the hospital dealing with a non-Covid-19 hospitalization. As you will see through reading this I was on sensory overload. My experience with taste when it comes to my hospitalization was not one of joy, but one of provisional change due to introduction of various new medical regiments which made things tasting like metal along with various other side effects. The over powering aroma of alcohol wipes and various chemicals burned my nostrils causing my eyes to water with irritation and redness. Desiring the touch of a loved ones other then the nurses pin pricks and the doctors jabs however, due to Covid restrictions my only comfort was my husband. With the on going treatments of chemotherapy I had caused numbness in my toes and fingers which felt like knives. I am a 35 year old man who is diagnosed with stage Three-B Testicular Cancer who was healthy one minute and who's world was turned upside down the next moment. So, my Covid-19 experience has been that of Chemotherapy, isolationism, crying, hospital smells, changing of all of my sensory parts of my body, and more. This is important to me because it has changed my life, Covid-19 experience, work-life, and many other areas.
• 
  2020-10-12T09:40

  Our Six-Week, COVID-19 Baking Crisis

  My wife and I were both home from our jobs by mid-March because the COVID-19 pandemic had, for all effective purposes, practically shut down our home state of Alabama. During our long sequestration from the world, we often baked together to pass the time. Tamsie has a sourdough bread starter that was handed down from her grandmother, so to keep the starter “alive”, she has to bake bread every month or so, which of course requires yeast. I believe that millions of Americans were at home baking during that time because we were out of dry yeast for her bread and, though we searched every grocery within a 20-mile radius of our home, we looked to no avail; additionally, yeast was back-ordered on Amazon, Walmart online, and every other online store. We were beyond desperate for that yeast, and the starter had to be near death when, at long last, I discovered an in-stock yeast on Amazon and ordered six pounds of it. Needless to say, I ordered entirely too much and thus unintentionally became that obligatory hoarder with which we’ve all had to deal during the last seven months. Thus, we had to bake dozens of loaves of sourdough bread to use that yeast! My wife is a dentist, so we baked bread for all her employees and left it on both their front porches and garages. We also baked for our neighbors and our families. The sweet smells of sourdough bread and sticky buns filled our home for nearly six weeks, as baking became an inane, daily ritual in the Rogers household! Today, whenever I smell fresh bread or cinnamon rolls, I think of our time spent together with our puppies in the kitchen, laboriously prepping, waiting for the yeast to rise, baking, and cleaning on a daily basis. I am thankful for this time, and though we now laugh about and much fun is had at my expense over my overzealous yeast spending-spree, whenever I smell fresh bread, I will forever be transported to our happy kitchen along with its aromatic sights and smells during the early weeks of the pandemic. It is truly amazing to ponder what we take for granted in our daily walks, and though I am obviously glad we are standing on firmer ground than in spring in relation to COVID-19, I miss our time together in the kitchen, which seems lonely and destitute without the sweet aroma of fresh sourdough bread. My association with this simple, yet happy memory during the pandemic is reflective of the joys we should be seeking in small things. Our daily lives are measured by our relationships, our serenity and contentment, and the joy we both provide and glean from others. The extended time at home with Tamsie allowed us a “factory reset” of sorts in our lives, one that brought our already-happy marriage much closer together; consequently, we no longer take life’s simple, quiet moments for granted. In some ways, the lasting human effects of the pandemic on relationships have been positive, in that each of us has had ample time to again focus on those whom we love.