There is so much uninterrupted time imposed by the stay-at-home order. Time to reflect, remember and wonder ­— what was it like before this all started?

Nostalgia for the past seems to have taken over, plans for the future are on hold. Those old files collecting dust and the many photo albums still crammed and hidden in used wine cases are calling for my attention.

My curiosity for past faces, stories, landscapes lets me know that I am alive and well, so far.

Excitement came from the worn manila file that I extricated from a sturdy file box titled “Sal Writing.” The file was marked “sketches, ideas” and was filled with an assortment of pages torn out of pads: large and small, yellow legal-lined and white secretarial, three-ringed and single notebook paper. They all carried handwritten sketches, ideas recorded hastily in pencil or pen, in gray, blue or black.

The small pages of January 29, 1994 caught my eye, and I started reading.

“The cellar is dark...Only indirect rays filter through the spotted, narrow windows overhead...Housebound by the unspeakable conditions outside...the frozen snow clods...the rain on top of it all...”

I was moved to look up and out from where I sat in my Chilmark home. There in our Island landscape at the end of March, 2020, is the beauty of green grass, lichened trees and stones, yellow daffodils, a stripe of ocean blue beyond.

This is only the beginning of Spring 2020 and I said to myself, be grateful for what is here, be glad you no longer live in the city, be happy for what is good, be diligent to guard the past, be courageous in facing the future, be all you can be for friends and family, and be Loving of this life.

Sally Cook lives in Chilmark.