Being an accounting of the recent and continuing pandemic and its various circumstances, from the perspective of an inhabitant of the regions lately called the Lost Quarter. Dates unknown.

Day One Hundred Ninety

I awoke to the wind groaning and rattling through the trees and buildings. It came in gusts that made the trees bend and creak so loudly I couldn’t help but wonder if their branches might go. The sound of it was incredible, like some monster come alive to terrify the citizenry.

I walked with my love to her tower, buffeted by that wind through the darkness. There was no hint of the sun on the horizon, the eastern sky heavy with dark clouds. The wind sought us out as we walked, finding its way through alleys, around corners, exploding out to catch us where we least expected it. The trees whose leaves have been turning have been undressed by the wind and the ground is littered with the remnants of summer. Their newly bare branches, up thrust to the sky, look strange without their adornments.

In the Lost Quarter the wind is its own entity. One always reads of the wind auguring something, bringing a storm or ill news. Here in these parts it simply exists. Its purpose is what it does and that is bluster and blow and scour the plains, seeking out every last strand of grass, every millimetre of existence.

It did so for most of the morning, though even as I returned home it was slackening. Now as I write this it is calm outside, the sun bright and the sky clear. The wind has wandered elsewhere, taking off across the whole of prairie, claiming it as its own.