Last Friday, the Berkeley Health Officer,

Lisa Hernandez, told ABC7 News:

"You should not meet in person

with anyone you do not

live with. Even in a small group,

and even outdoors with precautions,"

She said: "If you have a social bubble,

it is now popped."

On Friday, I texted our dozen regular 

garden volunteers a note:

until the New Year, we're not

going to hold our garden work

parties. Even in a small group.

Even outdoors with precautions.

We will stop. It was hard. It is done.

I had two goals for the garden this year,

one to start the year off,

and one that came later.

The first goal was to acquire a lizard:

to build a garden space with

enough food and shelter,

enough water and rocks,

that a lizard could call it home.

When the pandemic started, 

I added a new goal: to run

a garden safe enough that no

one would get sick and no one would

die, because they came to the garden.

This fall, we've had a family of 

fence lizards move into the garden.

Catch them sunning themselves and 

scurrying in the sandstone and the serpentine. 

Last week, Arike found a foot-long 

skink -- not skunk, skink -- cuddled

in the donated bricks. So we achieved 

the first goal.

And for the second, to my knowledge,

no one has gotten sick, and no one

has died, because they have been 

in the garden. It is a preventative goal,

not nearly as fun as a family of lizards,

but one I believe in with my whole heart.

So we will wait to interview trees, wait

to finish filling the beds with good dirt.

We will wait to see each other's winter coats,

see each other's smiling eyes above masks.

We will wait, and in waiting, protect the future.