Okay, David Horovitz, editor of TOI, and Professor Yehuda Carmeli, now you’ve done it.

You scared the crap out of me.

First of all, you have to understand—I’m 71-years old.

I’m a hand washing, mask wearing, social distancing kind of a guy who survived the 60’s.

So it ain’t that easy to scare me.

For many have tried and most have failed.

But David and Yehuda you have succeeded.

David your Q&A in the TOI where you question Professor Carmeli, a leading marvel and wizard of epidemiology in Israel, was just too damn realistic.

It hit a little too close to home.

Even the article’s title scared the bejesus out of me: ‘Under-50 have little to fear, but even vaccine won’t save millions of elderly.

The good professor went on to say, “Eighty (80) or more percent of the world’s population will get infected unless there is a vaccine that will prevent many of the people from getting the disease.”

WTF! That’s a hell of a lot of people.

“If we go to the population older than 70, the chance of dying is much higher. It’s eight percent for those over 70 [diagnosed as having the disease]. And 15 percent among those who are over 80.”

Those are some really frightening percentages for us older folks.

But something else in David’s article disturbed and frightened me.

It’s the photo he selected for his main image.

Yeah, at first glance:

a cool young girl wearing pink dress riding the orange Huffy bicycle;

a bike dressed in beige and orange saddle bags and a white handlebar storage basket;

a girl who attaches a cell phone to her handlebars and fringes to her bicycle’s bell;

a girl wearing the designer “Hello Kitty” mask;

a girl with the wild dreadlocks and the even wilder flowery headband, John Lennon sunglasses, and three-inch high-heeled white sneakers.

As we said in the 60’s, “One cool chick.”

David I get it—corona story— photo of cute girl wearing a hip mask, social distancing in a park, riding on her bike.

But there something ominous about females riding bikes that rings a bell?

Some Hollywood classic that I’ve seen multiple times?

And then the clapper in my head clangs, “The Wizard of Oz.”

I’m seven years old, biting my nails and watching Miss Almira Gulch.

She’s Dorothy’s neighbor who was bitten by Dorothy’s dog—Toto.

Gulch gets a court order to euthanize the terrier; puts Toto in a basket and rides off on her black bicycle.

Later in the Land of Oz, Gulch is morphed into the Wicked Witch of the West.

This witch with her black witch’s hat, hooked-nose, sharp fingernails, and stringy black hair scares the crap out of me.

I sit frozen next to our old black and white Zenith terrified every time the witch appeared on the screen.

That night in my nightmares the wicked witch ties me to handlebars of her bike.

And then it hits me like the clapper in the cool chick’s bicycle bell.

Why David subconsciously selected that photograph.

He wanted to warn us older folks walking on the edges of the yellow brick road—sans ruby slippers or a bucket of water—that there’s an army of evil monkeys willing to infect us.

David wanted to remind us on our arduous journey to the Emerald City to use our collective wisdom to stay safe, be brave and not stupid.

To watch out for witches on broomsticks, tornadoes, and evil monkeys.

David in his heart knew by scaring the crap out of us that he was saving our lives.

And telling us to chant Dorothy’s most memorable words,

“There’s no place like home! There’s no place like home!”

August 8, 2020

Dear Diary,

Due to this pandemic, my hair is longer than it has ever been in my whole life.

August 9, 2020

Dear Diary,

Due to this pandemic, when I brush my hair, it’s knotted.

Yikes!

What a pain pulling out the knots.

August 10, 2020

Dear Diary,

Due to the pandemic, I was just lying in bed thinking about pickles.

I’m lying on my back, with my hands resting on my chest and my fingers clasped together.

Thinking about life’s cherished moments.

When I challenge myself to a round of  the “cherished-memory game—pickle edition.”

Rules of the cherished-memory game—pickle edition:

1. Select your favorite pickle memory;
2. Fill in the following details: year, season, time of day, place and people and then rewind the videotape in your head;
3. Enjoy the film.

That’s it.

I’m 7-years old and I’m walking down Broadway toward Main, in my home town of Woodridge, NewYork

I’m headed to Proyect’s Fruit and Produce.

It’s summer in the Catskills; it’s hot—90 degrees in the shade of our maple trees.

So hot that the pungent odor of melted black tar eminating from the street burns my nostrils.

So hot that my Keds stick to the pavement.

But not hot enough for me to stop walking and reach into my pocket for a worn out buffalo nickel.

I take the nickle out, place it on my thumbnail, flip it in the air and catch it on the back of my hand.

I study coin— Indian or buffalo—heads or tails.

But it really doesn’t matter.

I have already decided what I’m buying on this quest for the taste of sour.

I crave a kosher dill pickle.

I want to munch into the dill and listen to each crunch as my teeth sink deep into the pickle.

Marching into the produce store I proclaim,

“Hi, Mr. Proyect. How are you doing today?”

“Swell kid. How are you doing? Do you need any help?”

“Great. But it’s pretty hot out there. No help necessary.”

As I talk, I’m captured by the store’s smells.

I’m bombarded with odors.

The fruit section wreaks of ripeness—

Ripe plums, ripe pears, ripe watermelon and ripe apples.

The intoxicating sweetness wafts through the air.

As I walk past the fruits and veggies, my eyes capture a kaleidoscope of colors radiating off of each bin or wooden basket:

Yellow cobs of corn;

Orange carrots;

Dark purple eggplants;

Seedless green grapes dressed in droplets of water.

Toward the rear of the store, my nose twitches as I see googly-eyed carp, packed on top of a sheet of crushed ice.

And all the way in the back of the store, I reach the treasure that I am searching for—the old pickle barrel.

The old wooden barrel made of thick oak staves and bound in bands of steel.

The barrel holds at least hundred pickles.

A barrel filled with brine, kosher salt, vinegar, mustard seeds, coriander seeds and garlic cloves.

A barrel that carries the pungent smell I have grown to love.

I study the bobbers for size and color.

I pull a “half-sour” out of the pickle barrel—still crisp and bright green.

I hand my nickel to Mr. Proyect.

“Thanks Mr. Proyect. You’ve got the best pickles in the whole wide world.”

“Thanks kid. See you later.”

Walking home, munching on my dill and licking the pickle juice off of my lips, I realize life is good.

August 12, 2020

Dear Diary,

Due to this pandemic, I  had an opportunity to relive a cherished memory of my youth.

And life is still good.

Looking Mom straight in her beautiful dark-brown eyes, I begged,

“Mom, I’m embarrassed bringing a brown paper-bag lunch to school.

My friends are making fun of me.

They’re laughing at me.

They’re saying, “We can’t afford to buy a real lunchbox.”

I paused to take a breath, “My friends have cool cowboy lunchboxes with thermoses.

I promise I’ll do all my errands—all my homework.

I’ll try to get better grades.

I promise I’ll contribute some portion of my allowance to buy the lunchbox.

Pretty, pretty please, buy me a cowboy lunch box for Hanukkah.”

“Okay, next time I’m in Middletown, I’ll buy you a lunchbox.”

My nagging worked.

“Maybe next time, I’ll beg Mom for a trip to Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch,

I betcha Gene will let me ride Champion, twirl his six shooter, and lasso some long horns.

But that was too easy.”

I felt pangs of guilt.

“Mom’s love for me was just too great.

The old-look-her-straight-in-the-eyes-and-beg trick was taking unfair advantage of her maternal love.

Gene would definitely disapprove.

But it worked so well.

Now I needed to plant some Gene Autry lunchbox seeds in Mom’s head.

Mom already knew I loved “The Singing Cowboy.”

She heard me singing, Back in the Saddle Again, Don’t Fence Me In and Home on the Range.

I wrote Mr. Autry fan letters.

I wrote western tunes for my mom.

Mom loved them.

So on the first night of Hanukkah, when Mom presented me with an official “Gene Autry” lunchbox I was not surprised.

But I yelled out my best “Yippee Ki Yay,”  and gave Mom a hearty hug.

Mom smiled and I thought I saw a tear form in one of her eyes.

Touching the metal box, I beamed at the artwork as if it were a Frederic Remington.

Gene pulled Champion’s reins, the bit caused Champion to rear his front legs into the air, while at the same time Gene’s twirled a lasso over his head.

A set of longhorns and the words “Melody Ranch” framed the picture.

A colt stood precariously in a corral; I imagined Gene awarding me that colt for doing errands on the ranch.

In the background, blue skies, white clouds and brown mountains stared at a saguaro cactus with its arms raised.

I opened the thermos and exclaimed, “Mom, look what I found scrolled up inside the thermos. It’s “The Ten Cowboy Commandments.”

Aloud I read each commandment to Mom as if they had been inscribed by the finger of G-d:

1.The Cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage.

2. He must never go back on his word, or a trust confided in him.

3. He must always tell the truth

4. He must be gentle with children, the elderly, and animals.

5. He must not advocate or possess racially or religiously intolerant ideas.

6. He must help people in distress.

7. He must be a good worker.

8. He must keep himself clean in thought, speech, action, and personal habits.

9. He must respect women, parents, and his nation’s law.

10. A cowboy is a patriot.

The day after I received my Hanukkah gift, I brought my lunch box and Gene’s code to elementary school with the 10 simple rules branded in my memory.

At lunch, in the school cafeteria, I stood to recite the “cowboy code” as if Gene and I were best friends.

No longer hearing the taunts of the anti-paper bag bunch, I relished the acceptance of the cowboy lunchbox gang.

Now over a half a century later, during this dastardly pandemic, I craved the comfort of my mom and my cowboy lunchbox.

I studied Gene Autry lunchboxes on eBay.

Remembering one of the many days when mom showered me with love.

And  I wondered, “Should I buy one?”

While deciding, I scribbled an intro to a contemporary cowboy tune.

“Hi Mom up in heaven, just a short note from your son to tell you how I’m doing.

Well, I’m corralled in my corona lunchbox.

Fenced in this cold metal tin.

Drowning in the sorrows of my thermos.

Wishing you were here with me again.”

Mom thanks for the unconditional love and for my cowboy lunchbox.

And Gene, thanks for teaching me what it takes to be a man.