A Look On The Lighter Side: The last 6 feet are the hardest part

Judy Epstein

A Look On The Lighter Side
When the last six feet are the hardest part

Experts are now promising that the coronavirus vaccine is close. “So close!” they say. “Just months away!” So close you can almost taste it.

BUT the very next thing they say is “Don’t jump the gun!” As I write this, it is not here yet for anybody in the United States. And it is still months away even for me, an AARP-verified senior citizen.

So what to do, while I wait for the metaphorical “all-clear” to be sounded?

It’s too late to convince anybody that I’m a first responder. I have exactly zero medical training (I didn’t even complete my Girl Scouts First Aid merit badge), and I don’t live or work in a nursing home. So even in the best case scenario, I have months still to go.

The weird thing is I’ve made it through nine months of waiting. So why does this last part feel so much harder?

It also feels weirdly familiar.

It feels like those days when I was pregnant, with a bladder threatening to burst, returning on one of our seemingly endless car trips back from visiting out-of-state family. After doing the opposite of filling up my personal tank at that last NJ Turnpike rest stop, then Staten Island, Brooklyn and home — even without traffic — it was always a nerve-wracking race against time.

And the hardest part was always the last 6 feet, after we’d parked in our driveway. Somehow, I could manage 60-plus miles of sitting tight, distracting myself with the radio and thinking of other things, but those last few feet to the door, jiggling my keys, finding the right one but IT JUST WON’T GO INTO THE LOCK — ARRRRGH! — the race through the house. Well, you know the rest.

It’s so darned hard precisely because you know that you’re almost done.

That’s the part of the trip we’re in right now.

It actually helps me now to visualize all the things I will do once the door to my prison cell swings wide.

I have refused to think about the future until now, perhaps because I didn’t fully believe I would reach it. But now that multiple companies have reported terrific vaccine results, I am allowing my mind to wander and myself to dream.

The first thing I’m going to do is get my hair cut! Or maybe colored and cut. But maybe not. This is an unexpectedly tough call.

I long ago took down almost every mirror in my house, but thanks to Zoom book groups, Zoom family meetings, and Zoom Friday night services, I have seen more of myself in nine months than in the previous 20 years. And I’m not in love with what I see, but I have invested a lot of time in this tangle of now-silver hair. It’s longer than I’ve ever let it grow at any time since I was in college. Maybe I shouldn’t be so quick to cut it off?

Maybe I’ll just ask them to put it up in some fancy “do,” so I can take pictures before cutting it all off again.

Oh, but a pedicure would be heaven. And a facial! OK, “Spa Date” goes on the list.

Also shopping! But so many stores have gone under — Lord & Taylor — I don’t know which will remain.

I do know one place that’s still standing, one I love: the Twin Pines Community Thrift Shop.

Whether I needed cowboy boots for a Purim Spiel or books or clothing or children’s toys, I could always find something at Twin Pines.  And, of course, the best part was finding something I didn’t need at all, like a Japanese Imari platter or porcelain rooster-shaped creamer. They’re housed in the Community Chest building overlooking the Town Dock, open seven days a week for shopping (donations only by appointment).

Which brings me to my very favorite place in Port Washington: the Town Dock. Technically, it belongs to all of North Hempstead, but the connection feels personal to me. It’s the very first place we took each of our newborns after the doctor-recommended six-week wait was over.

“This is Port Washington, your new home,” we told each of them, holding them up so they could see the water and feel the breeze on their cheek. And it’s the first place we went back to after most of our trips away to reconnect with being home.

Unless, of course, one of us was desperate to get into the house.

Here’s the most important thing to remember: Unlike those bygone days of travel, the answer right now really is to stay put, stay in the house and wait — just a little longer.

We can do this!

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