I’ve been thinking a lot about time capsules.
Maybe it’s because a good friend of mine recently sent a picture of a project he’d finally completed after more than 20 years. Since the late ‘90s, my buddy Matt has been collecting the ticket from every movie he ever went to. While on quarantine, he finally sorted them all out, organizing them biographically. He then framed them to offer a snapshot into his favorite pastime.
In one corner, are the movies he’s seen with his wife, including the first film they ever saw together. Another section contains lots of kids movies he has seen with his three kids over the years. I pop up a few times in the friends section and just seeing the tickets, I knew which ones we experienced together.
I never buried a time capsule, though I do find the idea romantic. The closest I’ve ever come is opening the odd box in the attic and seeing old photographs and newspaper articles I wrote when I began my journalism career nearly 20 years ago.
This month’s issue, I believe, serves as a bit of a time capsule.
Like life itself right now, it’s a little different from what we’ve done in the past. We probably never would have published a portrait of a chef with a bandana covering his face, for example, as we did with Cooperage Inn chef-owner Jonathon Perkins this month.
The COVID-19 pandemic has turned all of our lives upside down and for some, it’s worse than others. our hearts break for all the businesses we’ve covered over the years that haven’t been able to open this spring and for those servers who have poured us a drink or cleared our plates, who have put every ounce of passion into jobs that don’t exist right now.
Of course, we’re most sorry for all the North Forkers out there dealing with the very real health effects of this crisis. Too many people we know have lost loved ones or feared they might in recent months. The worry has taken its toll on many of us.
But we will carry on. We still don’t know when or how, but eventually we’ll reach our new normal.
We’re living through history. and one day, many years from now, we’ll look back and recall how we survived all these hardships.
Maybe somewhere, someone will pick up a stack of northforker issues and see this one, which sticks out just a little bit as something different. something from a certain time and place. something of a time capsule.
Grant Parpan
Content Director
