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This website contains the entire novel—linked and illustrated—along with information on influenza and bird flu, an art gallery & opportunities to buy personal protection gear and cultural merchandise (including books, movies, and music cited by American Fever's blogger).
 

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Monday
Aug242009

Day 55: Howard Roark Makes Me Write Funny

Nina writes to say she relished my account of the yuppies throwing drinks at me. She says I should tell you all how I gave her bird flu by cheating on her. Okay, I confess: Sneeky and I had a three-way with a stunning, long-necked pigeon. It was a one-night stand only because Sneeky got carried away and decapitated the poor creature.

For his part, Ric says Nina once accused him of fixing me up with women he knew. (He kept it to himself.) Her suspicions are evidently why Ric and I lost touch after she moved in. “I didn’t want to say anything because I’d never seen you so happy,” Ric explains. Now that I’m miserable and helping him reopen his place, anything goes.

DECIMATED, DEVASTATED, EVER DELIRIOUSLY PRETTY

The rest of you aren’t much comfort, either. You think I‘m abnormal because of how I write. Let me explain. I’m not a freak—merely an architect who cares about detail.

So when I find myself reading that a neighborhood in New Orleans was decimated in the flooding that followed Katrina, I know the writer is referring to the Roman military punishment known as decimation (which means to remove a tenth). This drastic penalty made every 10 legionnaires draw lots to choose which individual the other 9 would club or stone to death. I’d expect to see 90% of the buildings standing in a decimated neighborhood, with 10% of them wrecked.

Most people who know anything have come to think that 90% of the buildings were ruined, which is what today’s writers usually mean. That doesn’t make it right.

I was the kind of architect that aims to get everything correct. I will do that in every dimension at my disposal. Ever read The Fountainead? Or see the movie? (No? Well, buy them here!)

Not that I don’t care what others think. Keep telling me what you want me to write about, but please confine future queries to matters of Health or History—just no more Herstory, okay? I’ve posted enough about Nina.

I might skip tomorrow’s post—big party! I’ll do my best to enjoy it on all of your behalves. 

Tuesday
Aug252009

Day 56-7: At Last, Everybody Goes to Ric’s

My excellent friend reopened his restaurant with a smashing event that turned out to be several different parties, sequentially. I tried to arrive late because Ric had warned me that the first phase would be critics and celebrities, perhaps even politicians. The critics are said to have been delighted. The first write-ups were very positive. Boffo Blogging!

The place was crammed with yuppies. Avenue C was full of smokers and hangers-on, just what you want to see at an opening.

When I managed to squeeze inside, I found a lot of women smiling compulsively and trying not to eat hors d’oevres lest food stick to their teeth or they gain weight or something. The men were happily digging up the gourmet trough, using as few utensils as possible.

WHAT’S AYN RAND, STERN ROMANTIC REVOLUTIONARY, DOING AT RIC’S PARTY? (Portrait by Frank Zirbel)

I found myself standing in a crowd of masticating Uptowners, reluctant to pull exquisitely concocted bundles of food out of a tray in the middle of the worst disease mankind has ever faced. On the demand side, I faced the ever-cumbersome mask problem. How to drink that Nebiolo the host slipped me?

Even worse, how to flirt with goggles on? I have Nina’s accusation to live up to.

I began poorly. It’s hard when your consciousness still belongs to someone, but I had to start somewhere. The women in black dresses ran off one by one, claiming friends were waiting for them in the other room. I’m lucky they didn’t fetch pals to throw drinks at me.

I met a reporter from a local paper—a rascally sort of guy with eyes that wink without moving. I think he widens them to seem sarcastic when he says anything that sounds idealistic or gullible. He was pretty well informed. Before heading home to the wife and kids, he arranged to buy some masks.

Then I hung alone, as if from a string. I hate that.

Ric spared me by explaining that my protective gear was scaring people and that the hip crowd would be coming later. I was wondering what had happened to the LES DIY.

The (Wet) Sidewalks of New York

I strolled the Lower East Side, which seems to have shrugged off the recent unpleasantness. Street corner entrepreneurs again hiss drug names at passersby (ignoring New York’s ignoble status as what NBC’s local station called the “marijuana arrest capital of the world”). The sidewalk crust of dog dung has cracked, revealing time-honored urine trails.

When I returned, the swarm was younger, louder, counter-cultured. I spotted numerous locals and members of the LES DIY stuffing themselves. They had hung up their masks, which made me feel even more out of place but allowed me to see their faces.

Many sported the infamous scowl that veteran East Villagers turn into a permanent sneer, but they looked happy to be relaxing together: a gang of do-gooders who did really well.

I wondered if my wise and persistent correspondent were present. It seems clear from her texts that she’s a DIYer, a woman (duh), and a night owl like me. She has never offered clues to her age or style, though she’s pretty savvy about how men and women relate. She has never referred to meeting or seeing me and has made it impossible for me to reply to her emails except publicly, in these posts. She might be older, offering flu support from behind an email screening service and a door lined with Multilocks.

Sifting the possibilities taught me something virtuous about wearing goggles: It’s easy to scan a roomful of women without being obvious.

I began with someone I’ve suspected—Anna, the food czar, who normally works as a event planner and lost her job when the pandemic broke out. She’s a diminutive princess with luminous skin and high, elegant bones. There’s a little tomboy in there: She could poke you in the arm, hard, if you annoyed her.

Anna was dressed in black cling that left a lot exposed. This surprised me because her smile was as distant and sad as ever. I don’t know if it’s because her volunteer gig has ended (temporarily, I fear), or because she lost her little girl to the flu. Probably both.

I took off my mask and goggles to commence our first-ever conversation. Seeing so much of me may have frightened her. Her wide gray eyes darted around like mourning doves in hunting season.

Then she asked when I expect the next wave of bird flu to commence. A girl after my own heart! It could start tomorrow or in six months, I began. No one even knows why there has to be a hiatus. Is it the eye of an epidemiological hurricane?

Ayn Rand: Communicable Discomfort

Anna asked what I thought of the government’s response to the pandemic, then looked bored when I said that anyone who needs the government has made at least one mistake. (Which she’d know if she were a faithful reader, right?) I raved about the LES DIY’s work, and she thanked me for helping. Would I join them? Never, I said, Ayn Rand would kill me. I was joking, sort of. (Rand is dead, but I’m pretty sure she’d disapprove of the LES DIY).

Our conversation imploded. Discomfort is so communicable.

Somehow my brain overheated. I wanted to know more about her, so I asked about her daughter. I don’t recall why or how I phrased it, but the best adjective must be: badly.

Anna looked confused, then suspicious. She went impossibly pale, fixed her eyes on an empty chair. They grew moist. I wanted to comfort her. I stuttered an apology.

A DIYer who co-owns an organic bagel shop abruptly engaged her in a one-way conversation about someone I don’t know. Maybe she was protecting Anna. As she started rubbing Anna’s neck and shoulders, I felt like a grain of sand stimulating an oyster in all the wrong ways. There’d be no pearl for me.

Red-faced, I moved away before Anna spoke again. I tried not to look at her after that, which took some effort. Her bare navel shimmered like gold, a testament to the wealth of Vitamin D in Ric’s backyard. It hurt that we had felt closer in this very place, amid microbial menace, than we could feel now.

The LES DIY women ate a lot more than the previous female guests. Their bodies and characters were fuller. The most arresting was Vanquisha, a retired transsexual nightclub personality who tends sick rescue animals for a shelter. She joined out of friendship, knows little about bird flu, is unlikely to be one of my readers.

The next activist I probed turned out to be a socialist bike rebel who thought I was insane to have spent years anticipating a virus.

A woman with powder blue eyes and a hard expression was intriguing and seemed to be watching me closely. She decided I was a creep when I asked if she had written to me.

No one, in fact, mentioned my website or blog. Where was my fan?

I was tempted to ask Ric who she might be. But I never seek the inside story on a woman. Even close friends are usually wrong: A little knowledge is a dangerous invitation to misjudge. Best to follow your instincts.

Then came a DIYer I’d never noticed—a medical student in epidemiology. She hadn’t had much time to volunteer because she was working in two clinics, but she seemed cool. She’s a true believer who aims to help society prepare for the second wave.

Rise of the Valkyrie

Henceforth she shall be Val, for Valkyrie. She’s a tall, vital blonde with hazel eyes, exactly my height and wider in the right places. A perfect ‘write-in’ candidate.

Val had been impressed with my mask, which DIYers had given her. She wasn’t allowed to wear it at work, where everyone was forced to use the same protective equipment. Ayn Rand wrote all about socially ordained mediocrity.

Val wanted to step outside for a smoke. I’d have walked a mile for one if it might establish that she’d been writing to me.

She had something nicer in mind. We walked in what I eventually realized was a pattern of one-way streets whose traffic was always coming at us. No cops were going to sneak up behind this lady. She was pleased to let go after months of tension and overwork, regaling me with things she’d seen at hospitals.

The public health system came closer to snapping than I had suspected. There’s a desperate global shortage of ventilators, which I’d predicted. A lot of equipment failed from overuse, which I hadn’t considered. There aren’t enough needles to vaccinate many people.

If the second wave commences soon, the medical industry will collapse. Staffers are fed up. With vaccination mandatory for New York State medical professionals, many worry about the prospective H5N1 shot. People are tired, dispirited.

“The problem is that we did well enough going through the motions in a mild pandemic to let everybody think the system works,” Val said, “which was probably the worst thing that could have happened.”

She was warming up when I realized I felt dizzy. I’d drunk too much wine and had stupidly eaten little. Val’s smoke was especially thick.

She kindly located a stoop so we could talk some more.

It was gloriously unthinkable when we kissed, like unsafe sex would have seemed a year ago. However clumsy I felt, it was delicious to explore a mouth other than Nina’s. A warmer, deeper, softer space welcomed me.

Then we heard the voices, a chorus chattering in our direction, wherever we were. Soon they were upon us—the women of the LES DIY—and we were embarrassed. At least I was. Anna looked up at me, then away, as usual.

After greetings, Val left with them. We didn’t even get to trade email addresses. I’m convinced she already has mine.

Wednesday
Aug262009

Day 58: No Fears for Tears

I’m watching the body count rise in India, where so many died in 1918. Could this be the start of the Second Wave? It’s way too early. Dread the thought.

To its credit, the New York City Department Of Health & Mental Hygiene is reminding people that a second pandemic wave is inevitable. They’ve posted ads on subways and buses telling people to keep scrubbing their hands. (Unfortunately, these alternate with NYPD placards urging us to turn each other in, anonymously, for whatever.)

HERE'S LOOKING AT YOU, KID (Erin Silverman)

New Yorkers don’t want to read about microbes while they rock along, clinging to dirty poles and breathing one another’s breakfast. The overhead blurbs about hemorrhoid surgery and how to learn computers are nasty enough.

Torture comes in waves, too. You can be heroic the first time. It’s when the brutes come back with tongs or electrodes or hoses that your imagination starts to work against you, anticipating whatever they haven’t done yet. You torment yourself on their coffee breaks. By the third round, you’ll invent anything they wish to hear.

Romance also circles back. It was so cool kissing Val that by the time I got home, I was drowning in memories of Nina. I was stirred and sad after a few moments of intimacy with someone. Still, I think knowing Nina was good for me. No regrets.

I do feel wretched about having upset Anna at Ric’s reopening. As much as anyone I know, she’s earned the right to relax, rejoice in her own survival. Having seen her cry twice, I can report that it’s an impressive sight. Tears assemble atop her cheekbones like imperial phalanxes, ready to wash away any rebels below.

Fortunately for Anna, crying reduces tension. A study compared the chemical content of tears from women who cried for emotional reasons with that of tears stimulated by onions. The emotive drops contained high levels of neurotransmitters and hormones linked to stress. Shedding tears lowered blood pressure and pulse rates, smoothed brain waves. Crying supports the immune system, memory, and appetite.

My stepmom always says men stew in our own juices. Now I think she means we don’t cry. According to this report, it turns us off when women tear up. (That hasn’t been my experience.)

I always wish I could comfort Anna. I hope something—or someone—does.

 

Thursday
Aug272009

Day 59-60: Crusoe vs. Roark, Round One

My mystery correspondent has resorted to snail mail to send me what she insists in an unsigned typed note is no joke—Daniel Defoe’s novel, Robinson Crusoe. She sent the paperback Priority two days after Ric’s party. 

STRANDED WITH AN INTRIGUING BOOK

The note says Defoe 300 years ago was a fresher writer and thinker than Ayn Rand was 50 years ago. I’ll check it out, however doubtfully. Of course I’ve read Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year, an extremely realistic account of the Black Death in 1665 London. (Buy them both here!) Some suspect the British government paid him to write propaganda to stir public support for unpopular measures they were taking against plague.

Face it, lady: Ayn Rand wrote good yarns. Sure they’re simplistic, but they’re driven by ideas and they’re fun to read.

Today I contacted the LES DIY’s coordinator, a woman who sang a New Wave hit in the 1980s and now runs a big community garden. She says the gang is hard at work preparing for Round Two. I pledged to keep them shielded in protective gear until this pandemic is resolved for real—and not merely obscured by social euphoria and willful ignorance.

She agreed to pass my contact information to the medical student I met. I suspect Val may already have sent me history’s first English-language literary classic. I want to know for sure.

I’d like to send her The Fountainhead. Then we can compare notes—she on copious rum, me on martinis.

I’m pleased to report that the LES DIY has officially asked me to join. Of course I’d never enlist in a collective organization, but I’m grateful for the recognition. I’ll continue to back their efforts. Now for some reading….

Thursday
Aug272009

Day 61-2: No Man is a (Happy) Island

Robinson Crusoe turns out to be a great, brisk text. It involves risk, enterprise, failure, fear, more hazard and enterprise, and then comfort, all in vivid cycles. The hero hurls himself into the sand after each shipwreck, wishing he’d been content with his previous lot as a survivor, vowing to settle down and serve God if only He will grant one more chance.

A THOUSAND FURRY FRIDAYS

Each time the protagonist gets a break, he’s gripped by a fresh ambition. The first great realistic novel is about one of fiction’s biggest-ever workaholics. In a way that Defoe never formally admits amid all the god-fearing rhetoric about hubris and greed, work is his hero’s true Grail, his salvation.

Ayn Rand would agree. She never bothered with religion, though she was a big-time moralist.

In the present context, Robinson Crusoe also addresses the anguish of loneliness, isolation, the possibility of dying unfulfilled, even unnoticed. In a pandemic, all men may wish they were islands, but there’s a downside to solitude.

Imagine being the only survivor of H5N1, or at least the only person you ever see again. For decades, Crusoe could see only himself—in a watery reflection, at best.

I’d be forever hearing Gene Clark sing Here Without You. (Watch it.)