Day One

 So, at midday yesterday, it began: Day One of The Lockdown.

A brief background:  Last fall, with the house mostly packed and our son off to his first year of college, we moved to Paris for my sabbatical and Bob's fellowship at the Institut d'Etudes Avancees.

Since then, we have explored and grown to love Paris even more.
 

Bob at his office on Ile de St. Louis

Montmartre

Place des Vosges

Cordon Bleu

Jardin du Luxembourg

I've tagged along and visited with old and new friends while Bob gave talks at conferences across Europe.  We squeezed in a long trip to India, in February, just before the virus took off in Europe.

Anna and Bob in London at Thanksgiving

Christmas Eve

Tommy in Verbier, Switzerland over New Year's

Edinburgh

Siena with David Van Dyke

Jaipur, India

I'm glad I have those happy memories now.

So after making the difficult decision to stay, at least for now, and with our loved ones far away, I decided to try blogging again, like I did in Morocco in 2010.  I'm not sure if, during The Lockdown, I'll find enough interesting things to share in a blog.  We'll see how it goes.

Day One:  Yesterday, before The (very necessary) Lockdown began at noon, I went out to pick up more cheese and to get a little exercise.  I found that at least in our arrondisement (neighborhood), there was still plenty of food (fresh milk!) on the shelves.  Maybe it's that the French are used to buying only food for the next day or two.  Maybe it's that people here walk to stores, so they only buy what they can carry or wheel (in small carts) home.  Maybe it's because people knew that going out to get food during The Lockdown would be one of the few times they'd be allowed to leave home. 

But there were lines.  Long lines.  And store employees were letting only a few people in at a time.

In one store, there were taped markers on the floor for the "social distancing" spacing.  In another place, they no longer accepted cash -- only credit cards, preferably the "sans contact" ones. 

So now that The Lockdown is underway, here's the question that Bob and I have debated:  If you are young (or like to think you are) and healthy, and you are permitted to go out to get fresh food (baguettes!) with the appropriate precautions, should you even do that?  How do you balance the risks to your mental health with the risks to your physical one -- and, of course, the safety of others?