July 6, 2020. Me: I want to smell my friends.
My Landlady: I know, sweetie. We all want to… maybe not smell our friends, per se, but we want to be closer to them.
Me: I want to smell my friends.
My Landlady: Yes, I get it, you want to smell each other’s butts and pee where they have peed and touch noses but for the time being you must stand beside us humans on your leashes and give us WTF looks while we shriek at one another from six feet away.
Me: I want to smell my friends.
My Landlady: Hey, give it a rest. We’re all frustrated and isolated and sick of the whole thing but it’s not a life sentence.
Me: I want to smell my friends.
My Landlady: (Audible sigh.) Look, do you have anything more enlightening to say?
Me: Research out of Oxford University indicates that proximity to a favored individual strengthens the immune system, stimulates the thymus gland which improves resistance to disease, lowers cortisol levels and induces the production of oxytocin which demonstrably reduces stress.
My Landlady: I want to smell my friends.