In March 1996, I unexpectedly returned to New York City from LA to be with my father while he underwent cancer treatment. There was still snow on the ground and the skies were gloomy. The City was painted with the black and white of winter.
Every morning, I bundled up, grabbed a hot coffee and walked across Central Park to the hospital. I stayed with Dad all day and into the early evening, reading, laughing and often just sitting while he napped. After settling him in for the night, I walked back across the park to my hotel, slept and started fresh the next day.
I continued this routine for 37 days, criss-crossing Central Park. Most days, I paused in the same spot in the park, pulled out my disposable camera, and took a picture down Literary Walk. With each passing day, a little snow melted, royal blue sky peeped through clouds, bulbs pressed up through the dirt and park visitors returned to the benches. Branches forced out their buds, birds returned with song and the City transitioned from winter to spring.
The day my dad was discharged from the hospital, I gave him a flip book of the photos I’d taken down Literary Walk. While my dad missed the change of season, he had this book as a reminder that what goes dormant comes back to life. That the black and white of winter is always repainted with the color of spring.
This spring (the first day is today), we live with a renewed need to see our landscape repainted. Under the gloom of COVID-19, we are feeling anxiety, pressure and uncertainty - economically, physically, socially.
For the past week, the Bloom Farms CBD team has been working from home. Our staff of ten, spread across California and New York, is socially distancing, sheltering in place, self-quarantining or doing whatever is safe, smart and required in their areas. In some ways, each of us now has our own Literary Row, a snapshot beyond our home window that is slowly transitioning from winter to spring.
Sheltering in place is not something we expected, but we are handling these moments of loneliness and worry by bridging the distance with snapshots alongside nature’s transition from black and white to color.
We invite you to join us -- virtually of course -- to create a new flip book of sorts with the Bloom Farms CBD team. Please share pictures of what’s outside your window with us as things transform in your area -- create and share your flip book of life in these moments, and we will share ours with you via email and social media. Invite your friends and family to join in. All are welcome. While we all can't physically be together, we can create beauty in the moment and maybe feel a little less alone.
Best,
Sally Nichols
President, Bloom Farms CBD