The lives of my brothers and I have led us to live in different regions of The United States separated by thousands of miles. Despite this, and for many years we made time for family reunions. Laughing, cooking, eating, remembering became ways of reinforcing the bonds of family.
COVID put an end to our regularly scheduled in person reunions beginning in 2019. My brothers and their families actually held a family reunion by video conferencing in 2019. Each of us each cooked one of our mother’s fav orite recipes and ate them during the video call, but it was not quite the same. We have done our best to maintain ties.
We phone each other often. My wife Christy and I also see my younger brother Sami, his wife and our daughter Allia during weekly Zoom calls, to chat and keep each other updated on our lives. Our older brother Razi could no longer bear the absence and risked a visit to Sami and me separately in 2021. He got COVID but survived after a long illness. The risks we are willing to take to maintain contact are extraordinary. Family is everything. What is life in isolation from the ones you love most? Not much I think, at least not as much as I want.
This pandemic is of historic proportions. Just when I think we may have turned a corner a new mutant variant arises. The separation is painful and the absence palpable. I long for the next time we are all together. Soon perhaps. Until then I will read Albert Camus “The Plague” again. He was one of my father’s favorites and given the current circumstances a fitting tribute to our patriarch and a warning as well. Still it is a tale of resilience and we Saydjari’s are nothing if not resilent.