What do you do when everything is in chaos?

Here I am again with the bleach and water. Today, I am scrubbing the outdoor shower in Chatham. There is a pandemic going on, but I always scrub outdoor wood with water and bleach.

We arrived here on March 3, 2020. My book, Three Whistles, has a chapter called “The Killer 1918 Spanish Flu.” In this historical fiction, I took the liberty of adding that Lawrence, Massachusetts had a bleach factory that helped save hundreds of people. Of course, I was obsessed about what could happen now in 2020 so I took shelter in Chatham, Massachusetts and I am still following all the guidelines from Dr. Fauci.

As I write this today, my mind traveled back to the time when I was 10 years old. My job as the oldest of five children was to wash our oak steps going up to our second floor on Elm Street with bleach and water in a bucket using a hand brush. My grandparents, Lucia and Domenico Pettoruto, operated a grocery store on the street level and we lived on the second floor.

The memory continues to grow as I write today. My mother was a child of parents who lived through the 1918 Pandemic. She learned from her mother that those oak steps had to be cleaned with bleach and water to sanitize everything in sight. I am thinking that some of the things she taught me are in my DNA. Why would I have written a chapter in my book on a bleach factory, I thought today. It never occurred to me before that my parents were children of a 100 year ago pandemic.

Since Three Whistles is historical fiction, I added a little drama to Chapter 6 and wrote that a bleach factory was located in Lawrence and saved many lives in Lawrence, the nearby towns and Boston.

I stopped writing today and interviewed a 98-year-old woman referred to me because she knew my grandparents and I am in the midst of doing Ancestry research.

It’s a day of reckoning for me. Suddenly I am back in Lawrence on Elm Street. Maria Santalongo talked incessantly about the old days. When I asked her if there was a bleach factory in Lawrence, she was delighted and told me the exact street it was on: “98 Maple Street, not far from my house,” and she went on about how the air in her neighborhood smelled of bleach.

The Lawrence History Center, where I spent many hours doing research for Three Whistles, confirmed Maria Santalongso’s facts. I must have missed that because when I did the research there all the history at the center was on microfilm and paper.

Just like everyone else who is trying to do their best, this is what I do every day since I have been here in Chatham:

1. I wear a mask on my neck all day just in case someone comes over.

• No one ever comes over except my children who breeze thru delivering food and news. They wear masks out of respect for my safety.

2. I plan every day how I am to cook a lovely meal. I am getting used to eating alone.

• There is a note on my door “Wear a Mask.” Every day I spray the newspapers, read and send my family the horoscope. I am not sure they read them but the text I get back is usually an interesting emoji.

3. I have an Apple watch that keeps me on my toes. Literally. Three circles have to close before I go to bed.

• My adaptation of water aerobics that I did when I was young is the good old try but crazy.

4. Every morning, I scrub down my kitchen with a green plastic spray bottle of water and bleach; this goes on every day even on Sundays while watching Mass on T.V.

5. I tend my garden for good health, which is filled with basil, big boy tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, hot cherry peppers, parsley (lots of it), cilantro and, this year, cantaloupes. My children know I love flowers, so they are bringing me lots of seedlings. My daughter helps me plant them. My son-in-law says I have a green thumb. I wonder if he is egging me on.

6. During the week I make an effort to send out queries to agents. The young people who read them make a great effort to report “Your project is interesting but not for me at this time” or “Does not grab me.” I am not sure they grab it and I muddle on to my next agent in "The 2020 List of Agents."

7. The last thing I do every day, I watch the news.

My muse is Elena Ferrante and her words speak to me today. She says, “Writing is her way of being in this world,” and for me that resonates a lot. She is tough but has a tender heart.