Parenting in a pandemic has taught me this: the grown ups aren’t coming and the point of everything is to fall apart.

It is summer. The woman, mid-life, bathing suit at mid-calf, emotionally deadened enough to her bizarre current state of reality where she really feels nothing beyond the mid-point of her still beating heart, climbs slowly into the lake. The water is cool but not cold. It soothes her hot, pale skin and surrounds her fully. Here in this moment, there is not noise or Twitter or barking candidates, global pandemics and recessions and worries and constant planning. In this moment, held by nothing but the arms of the lake’s ripples and her own weightlessness, there is nothing but the glorious silence and stillness of the water.

As she comes up for air, the silence is punctuated by reality. The beach is full of wet sandy feet. The water is full of noisy children. Her own children tug on her suit and she scoops them up, big and small alike. She reminds them that no matter how big they get, they will always be her babies. Besides, in the water we are all weight less. We are not weighed down by our bodies or realities or secrets or the general trappings of life, here in the water.

She scans the lake, searching the water for a person or persons she knows to not be there. For her own mother’s arms to cradle her once more as she did in that very same lake years ago. There are many things that mark this season of her life, but the most singularly defining feature is the feeling of searching for grown…