Today is my 25th anniversary of meeting my husband.

However, we won’t be going out for a romantic dinner, we won’t be ordering in, we won’t even be getting within six feet of one another.  We’re not sick, but after seven days of being home together, boy are we sick of each other.  This is love in the time of the corona virus.

Listen, I’m not complaining. There are far bigger issues out there.  And truth be told, at this point in our home confinement, I look at my husband with all the affection I normally only reserve for motel bedspreads.  And no, you do not have to feel sorry for him.  He knew I was a germaphobe way back when.  So while your fear level may have recently ratcheted up to DEFCON 10, you know what I call that level of anxiety?  Any given Wednesday.

I have lived in a germ-zombie world for as long as I can remember.  I’ve catastrophized a global pandemic just watching someone double dip into a bowl of hummus.  I’ve wiped down my airplane seat armrests and seat belt before antibacterial wipes came packaged.  I haven’t gone to a movie theater since I first learned about bedbugs and I haven’t sat on a toilet seat since 1976.  

All this experience with fear of infection has made me strangely calm amid this new era of contagion.  What is new, however, is that now I must convince the other people in my house – most notably my children – that the phobia they always poked fun at was not only prescient, but will be the prevailing force by which they now live. 

To that end, during dinner last night with our 15 year-old son, we talked about the dire threat to global human health, the need for social distancing, curve flattening, hand-washing and the necessity of aggressive containment.  And then we lowered the boom by telling him that going forward, we would not be comfortable with anyone coming over and/or him going out.  To put in a language he understood we said, “Like, not at all.”

He stared blankly at us for a moment and then, in a phrase suggesting he might have missed a thing or two, asked:

So can Huck come over?

What? No!  What?? Did you not hear what we said??!!

But I thought you said I could have a friend over.  I want Huck to come over.

By the way, "Huck?"  Who the fuck is "Huck?"

He’s my friend and he’s on his way over.

Over? Over here from where? 

I dunno.  I think Brooklyn.

BROOKLYN!!!!!

[All due to you, Brooklyn, but you are not happening for me right now.] 

My husband is a calm man.  In his quiet reasoned way, he said: 

Son, we just explained that anyone who comes into this house puts us at risk. Germs from people traveling on subways and buses, even just riding in a cab, put themselves and us in danger.  Do you see?

A pause from our son.  And then.

Is that a no?

I then took a crack at it:

SO SOMEONE WE’VE NEVER HEARD OF NAMED HUCK IS COMING TO THIS HOUSE FROM GOD KNOWS WHERE OR BROOKLYN AND WILL BRING CORONA GERMS INTO THIS HOUSE AND INFECT YOUR PARENTS, POTENTIALLY LEADING TO OUR DEATHS IN A VENTILATOR-LESS HOSPITAL? THAT’S WHAT YOU’RE ASKING US???!!!

There was an awkward silence.  And then:

So, no?

Right.  So no.  

No to Huck. No to anniversaries. To graduations, to celebrations of all kinds, no to sports, to school, to work, to play, to seeing loved ones.  No to how we all lived before.  

It’s a lot.  A lot of nos. But in the spirit of what we can say yes to, today I remember fondly the day I said yes to my husband. I say yes to Face Time with my parents, to Fame soundtrack sing-alongs on the phone with my friends, yes to getting to the items that have lived on my To Do list for a millennia, yes to New York Times crossword puzzles, to funny texts and informative news being shared by the people I love and who love me.  Yes, I have always been crazy about germs and yes; I really do know how this feels for you who haven’t been.  But if you ask me is it possible to have joy and love and live life to its fullest when we are all so consumed with an invisible microbe, I’d say you need a lot of rules, you need a lot of Purell, you need a strong resolve but I’d still say, over and over, I’d still say…heck, yes.  And Huck, no.