Childhood Interrupted

I saw them walking around the neighborhood.  The bounce in the little boy's step caught my eye from my perch on the porch - my outdoor office of late. I noticed their masks first -- particularly how nonplussed (contranym as that is) the child was by it. (The bounce in his step seemed unaffected, after all.) My mind couldn't help but consider the resiliency and adaptability of children. He, simply, accepted the mask. I noticed next the matching gloves they wore -- striped, perhaps hot on a summer day such as this?

They paused there for some time, the woman giving the child some moments to find joy in stepping up and down on the cement block. Just as children do. So typical. 

And so in this moment, I'm affected with both joy and sadness. To see the valor of childhood; to observe it endure in even the worst of times is triumphant. But to know that this child is being formed with memories of masks and gloves and contagion and fear, that this is his foundation in life, is -- for lack of a more poetic description -- so damn unfair.