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Here's our seventh round of journal entries for the week. If you'd like to play a part in history as it unfolds before us, please send your submissions to lmizzi@southamptonhistory.org
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Mary Cummings (Southampton Village)
This morning on my daily jog to the beach with my dog, I marveled, as I always do, at the assiduous care the owners of summer homes give to their big, empty houses. No leaf escapes the blast of their landscaper’s leaf-blower. Their lawns are velvety green, their trees are perfectly pruned. Of course, it’s a far better thing than neglect would be, but what, I wonder, prompts such obsessive dedication? Later, as I was reading--something we’re all doing more of--I came across a possible explanation. There lurks in some of us, the author suggests, a “sense that the quality of the material world that surrounds you reflects upon your own value and therefore everything must be made perfect.”
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Joan Magiet (Eastport)
The dewy fingers
circle fragrant violets
a cool August rain
The channeled whelk lives
a prisoner on the beach
never making waves
Palm trees wave their arms
silent signals wake the gulls
fish are in the bay
Japanese maples
burst over scarlet shadows
glimmer of daylight
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Liana Mizzi (age 28, Hampton Bays)
Last week was my birthday in quarantine. It was a very different experience but my friends really made the effort to make it something special. We all agreed to meet on Zoom at 8:30pm and play some games and hang out. I decided since everyone’s been home bored that it would be fun to do a costume party! (Who doesn’t love a good costume party?). I was very impressed with what people were able to assemble on such short notice! I threw together a quick french-esque spider costume with dark eye makeup and a beret, my other friend came as a ghost in all white, another was dressed up as Hannah Montana / Miley Cyrus, and so many others. We laughed all night and after we sang and I blew out my candles, my best friends set up a surprise Variety Show via Zoom, with all different acts, dance routines, and of course more costumes. They each performed something that had a special meaning to me in one way or another and I had a smile permanently on my face during the entire show. It really touched my heart that my friends would go above and beyond like that to make my birthday feel not so sad and lonely.
I am so grateful for my friends and I can’t wait to hug them all when this is over.
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Jennie (West Sayville)
COVID-19
At first you were totally invisible,
Until you made your presence known,
Lurking, hiding, ready to attack,
Lying in wait for anyone to devour.