I woke up PUMPED at 530am this morning.
DAY 4! 10 to go. Whoop Whoop.
I’m still kind of on LA time so I have been falling asleep around 9pm and waking up pretty early. But my jet lagg is easing up and I’m feeling more grounded and rested today.
I’m enjoying waking up before sunrise. I kind of feel like I’ve achieved something already before the day has even began. Like I am part of this super secret early start society. I know my friends with babies would laugh at this. The reason that this is so special for me is, before the lock down, before March 15th, before it all went mad and when I was taking life for granted, I worked as a bartender in pretty cool, iconic dive bar in Los Feliz. I stood on my feet for 8 hours at a time hustling, pouring endless whiskey and beer, cracking jokes with the regulars while guarding myself from any inapproapriate drunks who came through the door. I went to sleep at 3am most nights and I was lucky if I got out of bed by 10am. So this 6am shit is a pretty big deal for me.
So this is new and I like it. I write better this early. My brain feels alive. After coffee that is. In our little rooms we each have a baby fridge which came with a box of Medow Fresh New Zealand milk, a kettle that i’ve placed on this desk and sachets of Moccona instant coffee and tea.
The first thing I do when I wake up in the morning is lift up the blinds to see the world outside. To see New Zealanders on their way to work in the dark. Even the size and shape of the road and cars excite me. The sound of cars driving past even sounds different to LA. And sounds like home. It’s hard to explain.
I look out into the dark and see the giant tree waiting for me. Hi friend. In the distance I can see one palm tree. I think it’s been placed there just for me. To remind me of my balcony in LA and the palm tree’s Brett will be looking out too as I write this. The air looks nice and cold. Oh how I’ve missed seasons. I turn on the kettle and make an instant coffee. This gets me through until 9am when the restaurant in the hotel opens and I can order a proper NZ coffee. Oh my godddd. A long black. Soooo goood. I’ve missed New Zealand coffee.
I sit down at my desk and look out the window into the darkness. The lights of the BP station still shining bright with the wild bean cafe sign. I think of the very first commercial I did for wild bean coffee and pies. And then I think about all the times I asked taxi drivers to pull into BP after a wild night to get a butter chicken pie and chicken nuggets. Stuffing them in my face drunk on my bed at 2am. Waking up with bits of pastry in my hair. I am SUCH a babe. If only the wild bean coffee client had seen that! Maybe he would have put that scene in his commercial. I mean lets be honest that’s when we all eat pies right? Pies aren’t really a thing in the US. I mean desert pies are. Like apple pies etc but not really mince pies like we have. O.k now I want a pie.
Cars and trucks sporadically drive past on their way to work and the odd fellow isolation buddy, also in my secret early bird society, joggs with their masks on. Back and forth, back and forth. Trying to ignore that they are running around in small circles.
I begin to write. A 30 minute dramady I have been working on for a little while. I found it hard to write in LA while everything was happening. I couldn’t focus. It pissed me off because I finally had the time. I wasn’t working and I was getting decent sleep, not waking up like a zombie having worked until 3am. I just couldn’t stop thinking about the world. Thinking about the whole fucking world and everyone in it. Thinking about my friends that i’d seen on social media who have lost loved ones to Covid. All ages. Some pre-existing conditions. Some not. All couldn’t even say goodbye. Thinking about all my friends trying to get through this and keep going, feeling so uncertain and tired and over it. All the business owners and my local spots including my old bar all struggling to stay a float. Thinking about whether or not if i go hiking today I might catch it and pass it to Brett. I thought of our favorite restaurant in Echo Park, where we had one of our first ever dates, Ostrich Farm, sad that it closed down. I loved that place.
I used to watch Brett write in the mornings and then listen to him and his brother knock out ideas. Inspired but envious of their ability to concentrate. Little miss distracted over here couldn’t sit still for longer than 10 minutes. They found it difficult aswell, I’m sure. But they had too I guess. Deadlines were creeping up. Me, with no real deadlines except my own, was overwhelmed and anxious. I also felt like every word I put on paper was suddenly meaningless and irrelevant. Everything is different now. Everything I thought I once knew, I didn’t and nothing made sense anymore. Yet, everything is clearer. If that makes any sense. What I used to care about doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Kind of like when I lost my Dad. When my Dad passed away nothing else seemed to matter either. Things I used to care about I didn’t care about so much. I didn’t care about booking that job or what people thought of me. I just wanted to be with my Mum and Sisters and be creative. Like now.
Anyway my perspective and thoughts had changed. I had changed. The world had changed. So how can I continue to write the same stories I was writing before. I thought about all of the TV shows and how they will create this year? Will they even acknowledge this pandemic? Will all the extras be wearing masks in the background of 911 or will they just pretend this year didn’t happen. Will Christina Appliegate in Dead to Me season 3 wear a mask when she goes outside? Will there be protestors in the back ground holding signs saying BLACK LIVES MATTER and FUCK TRUMP at Laguna Beach? Will she have to put gloves on when she goes into wholefoods or hand sanitize her hands everytime she gets in an out of the car? Hmmm. How will other writers address this?
Anyway I can focus here. Kind of. I guess. Even though I am still thinking about all of the above.
But my brain is working much better.
I’m no longer in survival mode.
I feel calmer and happier.
800am. There is a knock at the door. A brown paper bag is outside my door. Breakfast. Field Mushrooms on Ciabatta toast. Yummy. Field Mushrooms taste different here. Juicier. Sweeter.
930am. There is another knock at the door. The nurses coming by to check my temperature. 36.5 (celcius)
I’m starting to get this thing down. Ok soon there will be an announcement on the speaker in my room… Sure enough “testing testing. The guests that arrived on July 1st will be getting there first COVID 19 test today. Please stay in your room until 1130am as we will be calling you one by one to come down to the foyer. “
940am the phone rings again. It’s house keeping asking me I need anything for my room. More coffee please and face cloths (towels).
I make the bed, organise my space and wash my two mugs and wine class in the bathroom sink with the washing liquid housekeeping put outside my door. They can’t come into clean the rooms so everything we need is left outside our door for us to collect. We then put any dirty towels or linen and rubbish (trash) outside into the hallway. The staff from the hotel walks through every morning, noon and night collecting any rubbish and dirty towels. This must be strange for the Hotel Staff. Definitely not what they signed up for before the pandemic.
I put on my jogging shoes, airpods in ears and run out the door. At reception the two members of the NZ navy sit behind a glass shield at the side of the front door. “0058” I said. A nice Navy woman says “Amy is it?” “yes it is!” I say, very impressed she is starting to learn my name. So nice. Human connection. Everyone here is so god damn friendly! But still real. Not fake friendly or over the top because they have been told they have to be. But just down to earth, genuine, polite, because that is their nature. They check us in and out every time we go outside to make sure we don’t escape the grounds or go missing.
As I run around in small circles listening to my girlfriend Jaewyn’s new single “The world has gone NUTZ” my mind wonders again. I think about everyone in America. I am still half there and half here. Still inbetween. I worry. Please please please can everyone be safe and ok. Please can they take control of this virus. Please keep Brett safe.
I think of my Dad. His very favourite restaurant, Gigi’s, is just walking distance from here. Right across from the Ellerslie racetrack. Which is probably one of the reasons why it was his favorite. I think about all of the fun family dinners we had there. I loved going out for dinner with my family growing up. It was such a special treat. We had so much fun. My dad’s very loud American accent telling stories so the whole restaurant could hear, be-friending everyone who came in. The owner welcoming us and shaking my Dad’s hand. Living in LA, alot of my Dad’s culture and personality made more sense to me. American’s are much more chatty then us kiwis. They love interacting when they are out in bars and restaurants. Strangers become best friends for the night. I think us Kiwi’s stick to ourselves a bit more.
Whenever I come back to New Zealand there’s still a part of me that thinks I might see Dad. I wonder what he would be thinking about all of this. About his home, America. I remembered the morning of 9/11. Dad waking me up before school, crying, saying come and watch this. Absolutely devastated. And yearning to be there with his family.
I think about my Nana, Gloria. I would die to have a conversation with her about all of this. About the protests in America. About the racism and police brutality. I heard your voice in my ear Nana, telling me I must go down and march for justice. For equality. Fight the facism. I remembered Nana proudly talking to me about how she surrounded Eden Park in 1981 protesting apartied and the springbok tour. She told me about the force the police used against the protestors then. I think about some of the newspaper articles here in NZ saying “close the borders” to kiwis coming home. I can understand peoples fear and the cost, but my Nana would have been absolutely appalled. Wild. My nana was a fierce labor supporter and human rights activist. She would be so proud of Jacinda Ardern and the work she has done for the country during this crisis. I grew up in Mt Albert who has elected only Labor MP’s since 1940 something. Helen clark included and good old Aunty Jacinda. We have watched her grow and evolve since she entered politics.
Still Jogging around the parking lot in circles…
I thought about my big sister who came and visited me yesterday and bought me a coloring book, color pencils and lavender oil. I am so so lucky. How lucky am I to have such a beautiful sister. Taking care of me, encouraging me to do mindful coloring. I desperately wanted to hug her. It has been 18 months since I have last seen her. She watched all of the other masked quarantinians walking around in circles, skipping, doing press ups etc and laughed. “This is so crazy” she said.
We caught up and talked about everything we will do when I’m out of here. Family gatherings! Beach side winter hikes! Drives up to Maugawhai, Wineries and lots of much needed sister time. I can’t actually believe that soon I will be free and safe to go out mask free. We talked about my nieces who I will soon get to see and squeeze in just 10 days! So soon!
Oh I should mention that I had my first covid test yesterday. Day 3. We had to stay in our room’s from 9am until 1130am as they would call us on the hotel phone in small groups to avoid crowds.
I was called to come down at 10am. I waited in line watching two parents with small toddlers on their laps getting the nose swab. One of the boys screamed and cried. The other boy, younger then his brother, was not bothered at all. Ok ,so if this two year old can do it so can I!
I sat in my chair and was greeted by a nurse. She asked me if I had a test before and I told her ‘yes I have had three tests in LA but they were done via the mouth not nose’.
She told me the nose tests are more accurate which is why they are doing it like that here.
I tilted my head back and the nurse put the bud right up my nose, into my head towards my throat, pressing behind the corner of my eye. I half laughed and half screamed. Damn two year old boy made it look so easy. It kind of felt like water up my nose or getting a really bad ice cream head ache. My eyes watered and I said thank you and went back into my room.
I received a message from my good friend Wendy. Her son Magnus has a rugby game close by so they will pop over for a visit! So excited. Wendy Brown. My dear friend of over 20 years. Her beautiful curly hair. I remembered the first time I saw Wendy at Kowhai Intermediate school when we were only 12 years old. Kowhai Intermediate also very close to here. Her school was visiting to do woodwork, or metal work or something and they used our facilities. I remember her beautiful long wavy beach hair and her posse following her closely behind. Wendy and I ended up in the same form class at Avondale college and became good friends. Such a good human, so grounded, so practical, so warm and caring, a little goofy sometimes. I remember her smiley eyes and cute giggle the times we have shared little inside jokes. Mirroring each other. The same way all of our girlfriends laugh and mirror each other in our own little bubble/world. Understanding each other completely after 20 years or so of friendship. Probably laughing at things not as funny to other people but always very funny to us. I can’t wait to laugh with them again. It’s been a while since I’ve had a good laugh.
Wendy pulled up to the fence, in front of the Pronto coffee shop. I ran back outside with the mask on. As I ran through the entrance of the hotel the navy woman said “Your in and out a lot today Amy!” “Yes! I’m lucky! lots of visitors!” So much love. I saw Wendy in her lovely, long, yellow, winter coat with her fiance Kevin and there FOUR kids! Gorgeous kids. All so much bigger then what I remembered. Beautiful curly hair like their Mum. It was so good to see them and I really appreciated them taking time out of their very busy Saturday. Rugby. Ballet. Soccer and a visit to Aunty Amy. I wondered what the kids thought of me here and of this place. Is Aunty Amy in some kind of trouble or in rehab? Wendy told me later “No, they JUST thought you had covid” Lol ! Well I guess that’s ok then.
Wendy offered me some fruit that she had in the car. I told her that they are not allowed to give us food. She laughed and said ‘Do not feed the animals” Bahahaha. You so funny Wendy.
Again, she laughed at the people running around in circles in their masks. It’s such a strange situation. We talked a little bit about America, the politics, this bizarre time and how happy we are that I’m home and alll the fun things we will do when I am out.
They had to get to soccer so we waved goodbye and then I went back inside. I had to lay down for a minute. A bit tired all of a sudden.
I guess i haven’t really interacted with a lot of people since the lock down happened on March 15th. I’m not really used to socialising this much.
I’m excited to get out of here. To see everyone. But I think I will not push myself into society too hard and too fast. Slowly Amy. Adjust back slowly. Nah just kidding. I’m going to PARRTYYYYY!
No but seriously I think these two weeks of isolation are almost necessary – well it is necessary to stop Covid filtering back into safe, utopian, New Zealand. But I also think it is mentally and physically necessary. Not that I don’t want to squeeze all my loves but I think maybe it’s healthy to adjust into society again slowly.
Oh also Mum came back today! She pulled up a stool on the other side of the fence and sat and had a coffee with me. She is just the cutest. We had a good chat and she bought me a Harmonica! I’m looking forward to learning some new tunes.
Private Dance Party Song of the Day : NUTZ by Jaewyn