I’ve spent this long strange year working and writing. With familiar venues for inspiration—museums, concerts, and movie theaters—temporarily closing down or limiting their access, I have turned to daily walks to keep sane. I’ve found cemeteries to be surprising and uplifting places to explore. They are home to unexpected creatures: I’ve seen herds of deer; a well-fed woodchuck with rough, pale fur; hawks. And the headstones can be beautiful and poignant, with their stab at permanence and stories of their own to tell. Those inevitable contrasts—life and death, transience and fixity—have really resonated and, perhaps oddly, provided solace. Moreover, the quiet beauties and quirky tableaus I’ve encountered on these walks have inspired me to pull out my iPhone and take photos, more so than I have in the past. A tiny pink mitten is stuck onto a branch, in case its owner passes by again. A clear green crystal is embedded into a geometric gravestone, like something out of Star Trek. I post these photos on Facebook, or text them to loved ones. This is a way to share with the people in my life, who I don’t get to see regularly—or at all—during this time of social distancing. The photos are a record, and another way to connect.

Janice Deal’s short story, String Theory and Other Animals, is forthcoming in FICTION No. 65. She is currently working on a collection of linked short stories, Sick Beasts, which explores the fictional town of Ephrem, Illinois. Her work has won the Cagibi Macaron Prize for fiction, and has appeared in magazines including the Ontario Review, The Sun, Catamaran Literary Reader, and Zone 3. Her first story collection, The Decline of Pigeons, was published by Queen’s Ferry Press in 2013. Learn more about her at janicedeal.com.