“Here comes the lady,” I hear a voice say. I’ve just come through the gate into my beloved neighborhood park on my daily morning coffee walk, and the every-Sunday pickup basketball bunch is on the court. We always smile and wave — yes, smile, because I’m sipping on my travel mug of caffeine so I’m not masked up, and they don’t wear theirs while they’re running around outside. I remind myself that there are many forms of health, and if this group of Black and Brown men whose communities are being hit so much harder by Covid are choosing to prioritize exercise and camaraderie, I’m not going to police them.

Which reminds me of a figure from my past: Dan Donovan, the owner of the Cape Cod beachside cottages where my family vacationed for 2 weeks every summer of my childhood. We called him the Mayor of Skaket Beach… but only behind his back, because he was honestly a little scary. Grandfatherly if you were on his good side, with a faded anchor tattoo on his arm and grizzled hair covering his chest and back for all the beach to see, and a New Yawk accent you could cut with a buttah knife. But gawd forbid a tourist should try to put their lounge chair on HIS part of the beach. He called the cops on our family once, not knowing it was us lighting sparklers on the sand one July 4th night. We ran into the cottage when we heard the sirens, and the next day we stifled our giggles as Mr. Donovan ranted about “those dahn kids.”

So I think about Dan as I stroll past the game, and the guys on the sideline ask me how my Thanksgiving was and I hope politely back that theirs was nice too. And I think about how a couple Sundays ago a police officer in a tactical vest marked PARK RANGER showed up and started gently breaking up all the basketball and volleyball and soccer games because of the new lockdown rules. I spent an extra hour hanging around quietly in the background until she left. Just making sure that nothing was going to escalate. Not in my mostly White neighborhood where families and friends from all around the area who “don’t look like us” come to enjoy the well-maintained fields. Not in my park.

I never wanted to be The Mayor. But if it turns out that I’ve grown up to be The Lady — a friendly fixture, a neighborhood character, using my very local power to welcome and include — well, that’s one more thing to be grateful for as this long Thanksgiving weekend stretches on.