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D: None of the Above

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By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

My wife wanted to get out of the house and move beyond the daily walk in our neighborhood for her birthday. We decided to take our teenage children to the zoo.

Back when our son and daughter were younger, a trip to the zoo was a cause for celebration, as they got to see animals from all over the world, watch various shows, spend about four seconds reading an interesting fact about their favorite creature, and continue to hop, skip and jump from one exhibit to the next.

These days, their thumbs do most of the hopping, skipping and jumping. Given the importance of birthdays in our house and the willingness to do whatever the birthday celebrant desires, our teenagers gamely climbed into the car.

As with most zoos this year, we had to preregister for tickets. Indeed, the Bronx Zoo requires visitors to use a date-specific ticket.

The experience of entering the zoo was remarkably quick and smooth, saving us the customary wait.

Zoos require guests to remain socially distanced and to wear masks. All but about eight of the other visitors we saw wore masks.

Most of the time, other guests also maintained social distancing, taking their turns to the glass to look at gorillas and apes, who didn’t seem at all curious about the appearance of people whose lips and noses disappeared behind masks.

While we circumnavigated the walking trail, all four of us reveled in the appearance of numerous animals, including an enormous bison and a swaying elephant.

It seemed slightly unfair to the ostrich, who is over nine feet tall and is the largest bird in the world, to share a pen with the 20-foot giraffe, which dwarfs a bird that also has the largest eye of any bird in the world.

Something about seeing all these animals, including a lemur resting in a tree, an arctic fox and a pair of lions, restored a sense of normalcy in an abnormal year. It was also comforting to hear the excitement from other people who all expressed similar sentiments in several languages when the giraffe started to run.

On our first trip out around the zoo, we stopped at three bear exhibits in which the celebrated occupants were either not there or hidden. Once we had circled the zoo and headed back towards the car, my wife played her birthday privilege, urging us to take one more look at the black bear, the grizzly bear, and the polar bear.

The first two bears remained out of view on our way back to the car. Standing alone along the railing at almost exactly 4 p.m., which was closing time, we saw the polar bear slowly emerge, then retreat, then emerge from a darkened den. We suspected he might have a keen sense of time and know when it as safe to come out and avoid  larger crowds.

He or she (we didn’t read anything about the bear’s gender) played with a toy that looked like the top of a garbage can and then reached up to a ledge to pull down a bone with some meat on it. After giving us an eight-minute private show, the polar bear took his bone and, as if on cue, exited stage right.

While the zoo might not be at the top of your list or top of mind, particularly during the winter, it offers a pleasant chance to get away from our own 2020 pens. The Bronx Zoo has a know before you go page, which you can see by searching Know Before You Go — Bronx Zoo, with details about visiting this year.

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Photo courtesy of Pixabay

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

My five-year-old neighbor Jack keeps me and his parents on our toes, and for that, I am grateful.

In this strange and challenging year, Jack offers a refreshing, clear-eyed and honest assessment of everything he sees. He speaks directly, asks questions and expects people to treat him the way his kind, caring and supportive parents do.

During the spring, at the start of longer walks around the neighborhood with my dog, I started the pattern of wearing sweatpants and sweatshirts during cooler weather. After all, with nowhere else to go, I didn’t feel compelled to put on a collared shirt, to change my outerwear or to put on my dress shoes. Speaking of which, I don’t think I’ve even looked for my shoes in months. The search for those shoes, and the black socks at the bottom of a drawer somewhere, will be a welcome return to a more normal routine some day.

Anyway, back in the first stages of an endless homebound existence, Jack saw me one morning, greeted my dog , who is 30 pounds heavier than he, and asked me one of the many five-year-old questions that he shares.

“Why are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday?” he asked, as if I were somehow on a walk of shame after an evening that stretched into morning in a college dorm.

“Oh, honey, he’s just wearing the same sweatshirt as yesterday. You do that, too,” his mother gently offered.

Then again, Jack was right. I was wearing the same sweatshirt and sweatpants.

Later, when a nephew who tested negative for the virus came to visit and took a walk with me, Jack listened to his mother chat with us. As we were walking away, Jack watched my nephew and me head to my house.

“Dan,” he shouted, “Don’t forget about six feet.”

Again, Jack was right. Comfortable as I was, even outside with my nephew, Jack learned the rules and was encouraging me to follow them.

Recently, Jack delved into the minefield of politics. Without any hesitation, he asked my wife and daughter about their votes for the presidential election.

His mother, once again, tried to provide a filter, suggesting that such a conversation might not be necessary or comfortable.

Our daughter, who has had extensive experience babysitting children of all ages, had no trouble answering the question in a way that wouldn’t upset Jack, regardless of his or, more likely, his parents’ thoughts on the subject.

Cliche as it seems, it occurred to me, listening to my wife recount this conversation, that Jack, and the need to meet his earnestness and honesty, offered a reminder about public discourse.

Five-year-olds may not know everything, but they know when an adult is being condescending or is belittling them. They need the same kind of honesty they give.

At the same time, they need answers that don’t insult them. Even if they, or their parents, have different views, they need to know that others respect them.

Therein, it occurred to me, lies the lesson. We don’t need to avoid conversations with each other about topics on which we disagree. We are guaranteed the freedom to disagree with everyone, from our siblings, to our parents, to the president.

We also might do well to think of others who are speaking to us as Jack. We don’t need to picture others as five-year-olds. We can, and will, engage in more satisfying discourse if we follow some of the same principles when speaking with anyone. With so many challenges ahead, we will accomplish more together, and respectfully, than if we take each other down.

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Photo courtesy of Pixaby

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Hello and welcome to the first and hopefully last Zoom Thanksgiving. Hey, hold on, I can see that you’ve muted yourself in Box 6 over there, Uncle Mary. Yes, I know I said Uncle Mary because I’m reading the name on your screen. Did you think that was funny? What are you saying that I can’t hear?

OK, so we’re going to forego the usual list of what we’re thankful for because it’s 2020 and we’re not together, and I promised the kids they wouldn’t have to talk to such a large group of faces who are all
looking in the wrong direction.

Seriously, what’s wrong with you people? Can’t you look at the camera? I know that might sound harsh. I just spent the last few hours before this fake happy scene trying to remember something about the Ottoman Empire. No offense to the Ottoman Empire, but I didn’t like history much when I was that old and now I’m trying to learn it again.

Yes, I know, Uncle Mary, it’d be easier for me to teach my kids these subjects if I pretended to be interested, but that ended in early April, when I had to try to remember something about the number of electrons in different orbits around atoms.

Anyway, I’m thankful we’re together. I saw that, cousin Clarence. Look, we don’t see you very often. The least you could do is not roll your eyes the entire time I’m talking. You’re doing it again! Cut it out! Oh, really? You have something in your eye? Let me see. Oh yeah, it does look red.

Okay, so we’re going to make this virtual Thanksgiving all about the senses. You see, we’re going to each search through our house for things that look like something else, put them on the screen and guess what the other person is holding. I read something about being creative this year, so this is it.

No, Alex, you can’t ask a question. Because I said you couldn’t. I’m running this virtual Thanksgiving, and I said you couldn’t. Well, then, your teacher is a better person than I am. I wish he was your father, too. No, no, I didn’t mean that. I just mean that we’re doing something differently this year. Okay, if you stop crying, you can ask a question.

Well, actually that is a good question. It doesn’t really have anything to do with Thanksgiving per se, but guessing what we’re holding is a way for each of us to connect. Okay, so, now, everybody, go get something and bring it back.

Ah, I see Uncle George has come back with something that looks like a baseball. Oh, it is a baseball? That’s not very creative. Oh, Uncle George, you’re not going to tell the story about how you almost caught a foul ball hit by Mickey Mantle, are you? Oh, you were? Well, that is a great story, and I’m sure there’s someone who hasn’t heard that story yet. By a show of hands, who hasn’t heard that story? Okay, well, Uncle George, it’s only because we all listen to you so carefully and we love to hear your stories. Maybe, though, we’ll skip that one this time. Are you crying too, or do you have something in your eye?

Okay, someone else go. Matthew, what are you holding? It looks like an origami bird. Wait, it is an origami bird? I wasn’t supposed to guess it that quickly? Well, it’s because you did such a great job. Now you’re crying?

Okay, it’s Jennifer’s turn. It looks like a huge glass of wine. You’re drinking it to test it? So, it was wine? And now you’re refilling it and drinking it again? One more time? Really? Okay, anyone else want to go?

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METRO photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Are we coming apart together, coming together apart or just coming apart? The first in that list, coming apart together, gives us a chance to feel connected to others. By coming apart together, we are acknowledging the challenging year we’ve had and continue to have.

Without offering specific solutions, it helps to know we’re not alone and that, perhaps, through the together part, we can manage through conditions that are far from optimal, including the separation we feel from so many people we need in our lives.

Now, if we’re coming together apart, we are focusing on the fact that we can be, and are, together first, before we also admit that we may be hundreds or even thousands of miles away from people whose hugs, smiles and laughter fill the rooms we share. Zoom, FaceTime and other modern conveniences make it possible for us to see each other’s faces, even though the image of the other person can feel flat compared to the reality of sharing time and space.

The third of those possibilities, just plain coming apart, enables us to throw up our arms and acknowledge the reality of our world. Many children are home most, or all, the time. Parents are still working through
Zoom, looking at small squares of people on computer screens for way too many hours during the day. The sameness of each day can become tedious and wear on our nerves, especially during this time when we’d typically plan for family visits.

And, of course, without passing any specific judgment, the hot button election continues to drive wedges among families, friends and neighbors, who can’t imagine how the other side fails to see the obvious realities their favorite anchors or faux news and commentary shows echo each day.

It’s agonizing to see how the differences between camps have become a defining feature and have stirred a sense of frustration and antipathy for the other camp.

Where are the adults in the room? For so long, the country brought together people from different backgrounds, uniting us under the umbrella of an American Dream that was available to anyone who worked hard enough for it.

Our sports-crazed culture believed in the winners they cheered for and used their teams as an inspiration to get ahead, to put more into their craft and to try to win the battle for original ideas. Even fans of hated rivals acknowledged the skills and remarkable games they witnessed from their rivals during heated playoff series. I always rooted against Red Sox great Carl Yastrzemski, but I also recognized his incredible talent.

Will a vaccine enable us to come together, together? I hope so. Next year at this time, if we have returned to some level of normalcy that allowed us to visit with our friends, to celebrate weddings, graduations, birthdays, and newborns, we will have the structural opportunities to spend time indoors, even in crowded rooms, and support each other.

Between now and then, ideally we’d plant the seeds that enable us to move forward together. We are not an archipelago nation, separated from each other by the ideological, religious or other labels. We do best when we play to the strengths of a workforce dedicated to getting ahead, to providing for our children and to helping the country even as we help ourselves.

While many of us are physically apart, we can try to reach out to family, friends, and neighbors, even if their ideas temporarily baffle us. We can come together if we are there for each other and if we listen to views outside our own.

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Stock photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

With a number of extended friends and family pregnant during this turbulent year, I have been thinking about one of the first decisions parents make on behalf of children who can’t yet verbalize their preferences.

What’s in a name, you say? Well, just about everything.

A long, complicated and difficult to spell name could help someone stand out. It could also connect that person to a family legacy or history and enable him to
carry the trappings of a family tree every time he says or writes his name.

At the same time, that person, if she interacts with a large collection of people, may spend an enormous amount of time each day spelling or pronouncing her name and answering questions about its origin.

As an aside, one of my favorite names comes courtesy of a close friend who is a doctor. He was in the operating room many years ago during a complicated delivery by an expectant mother who didn’t speak English. She decided to name her son Nosmo. His middle name was King. She got the name from the No Smoking sign she read in the waiting room.

For some reason, when I meet someone, I struggle with two of the most basic elements of communication. First, they say their name. Something happens in that time shortly after I hear the name. I’m so focused on saying my name, which I’ve known all my life, that I erase her name. It’s as if a devilish part of my brain has blurred her name with a miniature eraser. That also appears to happen to other people, as  several of them have listened to me say my name and then ask, “Did you say your name was Doug” or “Dave?” They tend to remember the first letter.

You would think I wouldn’t have any trouble with such a simple first name, Dan, and yet, you’d be wrong. When I start with “My name is” or “This is,” somehow, the “s” from the “is” elides with my name, making my response sounds like, “This is Stan.”

To compensate, I have tried to wait as long as possible between the “is” and my name, almost as if I’m building suspense. “Hi, this is” … wait for it … have a sandwich … check your email … look at that pretty bird … okay, now, “Dan.”

Sometimes, when I’m outside, I hear my name when no one was talking to me or to anyone else who shares my name. I returned from walking my dog recently and heard “Daaaannn,” “Daaaaaaaann,” “Daaaaaannn” calls. At first, I thought it was my wife, trying to use her special human echolocation to find me, but it turned out to be a crow welcoming my dog and me back.

When people are flustered, injured, or disappointed, they often yell something. Unfortunately for me and, perhaps, other Dans, they shout something that sounds like my name. After stubbing their toe or reading a disappointing email, they scream, “Damn!” Hearing the frustrated and loud call, I match that with, “Yeah, what?” That might be funny to them, if they weren’t already annoyed.

The ubiquitous nature of my name has created confusion on athletic teams or in offices. My last name doesn’t offer an easy alternative.

Indeed, my son, who doesn’t share the same first name as anyone on the baseball team, is, nonetheless, nicknamed “Knife” because, somehow, Duh nay uff, became Doo knife, which was shortened to knife. It makes sense to teenagers.

As one of Jerry Seinfeld’s girlfriends on the eponymous show “Seinfeld” pointed out, it could be worse: her name rhymed with a female body part Jerry couldn’t remember, and it wasn’t “Vulva.”

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METRO photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

I’d like to add time to the list of things that have changed during 2020. In addition to our notion of personal space, our concept of public health and our ability to empathize with friends, neighbors and strangers around the world battling against the virus, some of us have a warped sense of time.

My brother calls it a “Groundhog Day” existence, the Bill Murray movie in which each day seems to be a carbon copy of the one before, as time stands still for him while everyone else thinks that one day is a unique part of a continuum.

These days, with so many people working from home and our ventures away from the house fairly limited, our daily existence, even in various phases of reopening, don’t change much, either by month or by season.

Indeed, for many of us, the weekends just mean two more working days from home until Monday. Now, we might not all be working as hard on Saturday or Sunday, but we are well-equipped to get that one additional project done before the week begins.

In addition to forgetting the day of the week, some of us have also developed a less clear connection to the usual merry-go-round elements of each year. Birthdays don’t involve the customary travel, we haven’t attended the same seasonal musical concert at school, and we don’t have the annual family traditions or gatherings.

That has meant both an acceleration and a slowdown in the movement of time. I am both stunned and not surprised that it is early November already.

To illustrate my point, I recently reached out to a scientist with whom I chat periodically. Not wanting to go to the same well too frequently, I try to separate my emails and calls by a few months.

Before I wrote to him, I guessed my last contact was about two weeks earlier. In reality, it had been two months since we spoke.

The mismatch between my memory of the interaction and the reality of the time that passed likely came from a host of factors, including the fact that I enjoy his insights, his sense of humor and the information he shares.

Additionally, however, the time warp is a product of the amount of running in place I do on a regular basis, whether that’s chasing down stories or providing updates on the ongoing twists and turns in our coverage of the pandemic.

Without much variability, each day achieves its own familiar rhythm, even if the days and weeks blend together.

For me, this week, with the election, arrived both quickly and not soon enough. It’s a relief that the attack ads, the cross talk and the vitriol connected with the election will end, even if the parties lining up on both sides of the fence line continue to shout into the wind about each other.

In addition to “Groundhog Day,” I have also pondered the Tom Hanks movie “Cast Away.” When Hanks’ Chuck Noland — wait, I finally get it, Noland, as in “no land” because he’s cast away from his previous life — finally escapes and returns to civilization, I thought we missed out on the incredible opportunity to see Hanks adjust to speaking to people after four years with only a volleyball for companionship.

Once our lives return to some level of normal, I imagine we will all make numerous adjustments, including to the annual journey through years filled with more varied activities and in-person connections with people who live further away.

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METRO photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

As we trudge through the last quarter of a year filled with challenges, I wanted to share some light hearted, ridiculous and truly 2020 fortune cookie message ideas. Enjoy!

• A vaccine may be in your future. Whether you take it is up to you.

• You will Zoom again some time soon.

• You will continue to see toilet paper in a whole new light.

• You will have another opportunity to learn an academic lesson you missed years ago.

• You don’t have to look hard to find heroes.

• The four walls around you will look better at some point.

• You will save money on gas this year.

• The election will end, hopefully.

• If you get off the couch and do some push ups, your body will thank you.

• This is the only 2020 you have. Make the most of it.

• It’s okay to lose track of the day: don’t lose track of your goals.

• Watch one fewer episode. You can make better use of your time.

• Use a shower to wash away your cares, and your stench.

• Don’t use a mask to hide from the truth.

• One person’s monster is another person’s savior.

• Feel free to pat yourself on the back. Don’t break your arm doing it.

• Petting the dog will bring you relief. Taking him out will bring him relief.

• Sometimes being odd is the only way to get even.

• Keep your enemies at bay. Six feet should work.

• Even while social distancing, do your best to stay connected.

• Love conquers hate, but hate can’t defeat love.

• Don’t forget to floss. Your periodontist will thank you.

• Lock your doors at night, but open your heart.

• Mythology occurs when we dare to dream.

• Take chances, but make sure you wash your hands.

• Consider what the younger version of yourself would do.

• Your children are not a younger version of you.

• Remember which days your kids are in school and make the most of them.

• Mute your computer before the dog starts barking. Your colleagues will thank you.

• Our editor is quarantined because he started coughing, so the gloves are off.

• When people calm down, they are better at solving their problems.

• When people stop telling other people what to do, they become more tolerable.

• Don’t expect a fortune cookie to change your life.

• Wow, you’re going off the rails there, George. Are we allowed to do that?

• Yes, Alissa, our editor is gone and we have to fill these cookies with something.

• Love has no statute of limitations.

• What, so you’re now a lawyer?

• I could have been, Alissa.

• Did you read about the shower? That one was for you.

• Perfect effort means giving 110 percent.

• You can’t give 110 percent. It’s not possible.

• Then why do these athletes say it?

• They’re talking about how hard they’re working. It’s an exaggeration.

• Your intelligence is an exaggeration.

• Get us out of here. They don’t even let us order Chinese food.

• Irony can be pretty ironic sometimes.

• You got that from the Airplane sequel. You can’t put it in a fortune cookie.

• In a fortune cookie? I don’t think someone from Airplane the Sequel is going to find us.

• That’s your problem. You don’t think.

• Thinking alone never cured anything.

• You’re wrong and you never tried thinking.

• I have to get out of here. That’s not the voice in your head. That’s me, George.

• Stop whining and start winning.

• You’re not a victim, you’re a survivor.

• That’s not bad, Alissa.

• How about ordering Italian next time?

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METRO photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Jill has been cutting hair for 38 years. She has owned a few salons, but these days she has been scheduling hair cutting appointments at people’s homes.

She wears a mask, asks her customers to do the same and does her work outside or in the shelter of a garage, where the wind isn’t as strong.

An immigrant from Lebanon, Jill is completely professional, asking for extension cords through the garage, setting up a chair for her customers, and carrying her sterilized scissors, electronic clippers and comb.

Reflecting on the decades she’s spent chatting with customers while she works, she has an easy, purposeful manner about her efforts, while she rolls her “r’s,” sharing linguistic hints on her life.

These days, she lives with her daughter, son-in-law and her three grandchildren. She has her own space in the house, but is hoping, before too long, to rent or buy a small place where she can call the shots.

She shared a story with me that offers some perspective about life and our reactions in the moment to our wins and losses.

Back in February, Jill had decided it was time to own a salon again. She pooled all her savings and placed a bid on a property. She was excited about the prospect of serving more customers, hiring staff and growing a business that would help her make money and increase her savings towards retirement.

She knew she was close to winning the bidding and had started imagining how she’d reinvent the space and the people she’d hire. But, then, the people selling the property informed her that they had chosen another bidder, who had deeper pockets and was a part of a larger chain. She was incredibly disappointed and felt as if she’d lost out on a business she knew she could run. She spent several weeks irritated by the situation.

A month after she lost the property, she joined the rest of the world in the pandemic-triggered lockdown. Initially, she couldn’t get out much.

As the days stretched into weeks and the weeks into months, she realized how lucky her loss on that property had been. She would have had to carry a $4,000 monthly mortgage for a location that was producing no revenue for months.

She considers herself an incredibly lucky loser. Back in February, of course, a mere month before the virus changed the United States, she had no way of knowing that her loss would save her from a mountain of unmanageable debt.

She feels as if a force from up high was looking out for her, protecting her from a financial burden and responsibility that would have been hard to manage, even with whatever government program she might have turned to for help.

Down the road, when the world returns to something resembling the experiences of 2019, she may, once again, consider buying a salon. Until then, however, she’s perfectly happy without the debt and the uncertainty of managing through a difficult small business and economic environment.

In the meantime, she will continue to show up at people’s homes, brushes, clippers and scissors in hand, ready to provide on-site haircuts to people who prefer, or can’t, leave their properties.

The challenges and obstacles that disappoint also sometimes protect us, even if we can’t see that in the moment, particularly when we know how much we want something.

Many of us will confront those frustrations in the future over which we have no control. Sometimes, we may gain perspective on what, at first, appears to be an unfortunate outcome.

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File photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Three years and a different world ago, I attended a scientific conference at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on a gene editing technique called CRISPR, or more technically CRISPR-cas9.

I rubbed elbows with some of the many talented scientists at an internationally renowned institution. In a casual atmosphere filled with high-powered talks from people who speak the language of science with accents from all over the world, the grounds at CSHL, with its winding roads and personalized parking spaces, offers a tree-lined backdrop for new collaborations and discoveries.

Back then, I invited one of the conference organizers, Jennifer Doudna (pronounced Dowd nuh), who is a Professor of Chemistry and Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of California, to lunch.

After a talk she gave to a packed Grace Auditorium, she and I strolled to the cafeteria to discuss a gene editing tool that has the potential to change the world.

Indeed, even today, labs around the world are using a technique based on the way bacteria recognize and fight off viruses to combat the effect of SARS-CoV-2, or the virus that causes COVID-19.

During that sunny July day in 2017, however, we were blissfully unaware of the challenges to come in 2020. We sat down at a central table outside, with people passing, nodding and acknowledging my tall and talented lunch guest.

While she responded to an appreciative crowd of casually dressed researchers, she was present and focused on the many questions I’d prepared for an upcoming Power of 3 column (see page B9 for another look at that column).

Like many revolutionary technologies and inventions such as splitting the atom, CRISPR is neither all good nor all bad. Editing genes creates opportunities to cure or prevent diseases and to disarm a range of miniature invaders.

At the same time, gene editing puts the power of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein into the hands of scientists or doctors, offering the kind of tool that requires careful ethical considerations.

Indeed, just last year, a Chinese court sentenced a researcher to three years in prison for using gene editing in unborn babies.

Doudna, who moved to Hawaii when she was seven and is a passionate gardener, is in the third year of a four-year $65 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which monitors security concerns for the intentional or accidental misuse of the technology.

Eating with Doudna on a breezy, bright summer day, I appreciated how ready she was to tailor the conversation to my level of understanding of this technology, offering details about gene editing and making sure I understood her.

While she was impressive and articulate, she certainly didn’t seem as if she were speaking to me from on high. She shared a deliberate and directed intelligence, blending a combination of an explanation of what she’d done and thoughts on the next scientific steps.

Doudna, who lives with her husband Jamie Cate, who is also a Berkeley scientist, and their high school senior son Andrew, shared an appreciation for the history of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where she’d visited at different points in her career.

Back in 1987, she spotted a woman walking towards her. Nobel prize winner Barbara McClintock, whose name still comes up regularly in conversations with scientists at the site, strolled by, giving Doudna a thrill.

The next time someone spots or interacts with the Berkeley Professor at CSHL, they will likely feel the same excitement, as Doudna was recently named a recipient of the Nobel Prize.

Then again, it was clear from the way the attendees at the conference reacted to Doudna three years ago that, Nobel prize or not, she was already a rock star in the scientific community whose foundational work may, one day, lead to the kind of breakthroughs that extend and improve life.

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METRO photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

We are one of the loudest families on the block, and there are only four of us when we’re all home. Well, five, if you count the dog, and you should definitely count the dog.

Every so often, my dog gets on one of his benders where the entire neighborhood has to hear him. He races into the backyard and barks at shadows that my eyes, and the eyes of my son, who runs to the back door and turns on the light, can’t see either.

Every neighbor presents his or her unique challenges to a block where we continue to spend a large percentage of our time. There’s the guy who drives too fast. We all glare at him, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He probably can’t see us because he’s moving too quickly and exists in a different space-time continuum. Don’t you love a word like continuum that dares to have two “u’s” in a row?

Then there’s the neighbor whose house is under constant construction. No matter what season, time of the month, or time of day, construction people are always there, digging, pulling, pushing, installing, removing, re-laying, resurfacing, ripping up, putting back down.

Who needs all that continuous fixing? I don’t even live in their house and I’m exhausted by the constant change. Sure, it’d be nice if that bulb above my wife’s head in our bedroom actually worked, but my arms are too short on the ladder and the bed is in the wrong place. I put my son on my shoulders and he reached up and turned, but the bulb and the fixture kept spinning.

On the other side, we have a lovely neighbor who is so nice that even the people who frown at the bunnies and deer, which prance through our neighborhood as if they were responding to a cue from a Disney director, smile at her. Her smile and laughter seem like a starter’s gun, waiting for a small cue to explode to the surface.

Anyway, the rest of her family is friendly enough, but doesn’t share her ebullience. They do, however, love their cars. The louder the sound, the more impressive the car, or so it seems. Their driveway hosts regular revving contests. Okay, how many columns have words with two consecutive “u’s” and two consecutive “v’s” in them? Revving continuum, anyone?

Somehow, despite the constant cacophony from the driveway, their house attracts an abundance of magnificent birds, even when they use the leaf blower to keep their immaculate backyard free of the few leaves with the temerity to fall on their property.

Then there is the talker. She’s incredibly sweet, insightful and intelligent. The two challenges are that the polite banter doesn’t seem to have a natural end, and she is so soft spoken that I find myself nodding and raising my eyebrows, hoping I’m offering the proper response to questions I can’t hear. I can’t move closer to her because we react to people as if they were porcupines, with six foot quills.

Then there are the adorables. These are the families that have young children who giggle, laugh and play, blissfully unfocused on the pandemic and thrilled that they are out on a bike or that they can identify a bird that passed overhead. They race each other on tiny bikes, ask me why I’m wearing the same sweatshirt again, and skip to the sound of music I can’t hear. They also see the nonstop trucks delivering materials to the construction house as a source of entertainment. One of our young neighbors was on her way to school on a recent morning. Her mother stopped her car and rolled down the window so she could tell me about Mrs. Cathy and Ms. Mary. Those happy adorables are the block winners.

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