Coping With A Worldwide Pandemic

There is a man who lives in the apartment across from mine who, for the past twelve days at least, sits inside and plays video games incessantly. I wake up early and go for a run, and by the time I return-usually before 8 a.m., he’s up and playing. As I go about my days working from home, I periodically glance out my window and there he is, engulfed in his computer screen, fingers swirling about his joypad. I doubt he ever moves. Lately, I’ve doubted his humanity, allowing my imagination to fancy my neighbor a robot.

In my apartment complex, each unit has an outdoor balcony, some larger than others. His balcony is quite large, decorated with sundry plants and settees and a large sun umbrella. The strange thing about his balcony though, is that the lights remain on, always. There is a wall light, ostensibly placed there to provide guidance to the rare resident who chooses to do laundry in midnight hours. But aside from the wall light, there are tiny white lights the man must have hung at some point, thinking perhaps that he’d sit outside with a friend or a lady, sipping mojitos beneath twinkle lights and discussing hopes, dreams, and fears amidst his tiny, apartment balcony jungle.

It occurs to me that he could save money by simply turning his lights off, that this wastefulness is as American a trait as any-our entitlement and lack of self-awareness underscored…