We counted in days

We counted in days.

We didn't know that days would melt together like wax, dripping on the pages of our calendar and blotting out each plan made. We didn't know that cozy warmth would turn to loneliness and that we'd still be wearing those handmade masks at Christmastime. We didn't know about the graduates that wouldn't walk across the stage, the couples that wouldn't wed, the jobs that wouldn't last or the next breaths that wouldn't come. We didn't know, not for certain, that so many of our countrymen wouldn't care at all if we died.

We counted in days, marking the passage of time while rites of passage crumbled. We counted the days at home, with children climbing everywhere or the ghosts of children lost or children never had hiding around each corner. We counted the minutes until bedtime, we counted the minutes until the sun rose. We counted the frozen smiles on the screen as we checked our internet, again. We counted the dollars in bank accounts, the food in the pantry, the neighbors in need. We counted the available beds left in our hospitals.

We counted in weeks, then months. We count in the currency of what has been lost. We counted in days, and now we count in bodies. 500,000 bodies and more on the way.