Month: July 2020

As states slowly resume business operations—or reinstitute restrictions as a result of premature re-openings—the only thing on 6lack’s mind is a quiet respite in the woods. The singer-slash-rapper and notorious recluse is currently holed up in a cabin on Los Angeles’ Big Bear Lake, where he spent his 28th birthday last week. After all, retreating is what he does best. It’s in these periods of solitude—two-year hiatuses between studio efforts are his pattern—that he creates his best work. First, there was his 2016 breakout album Free 6lack (for which he earned two Grammy nominations), no-skips follow-up East Atlanta Love Letter in 2018, and now, his newest brainchild, 6pc Hot.

The ease of recording his first two efforts was hard to replicate this time around, especially when set against a backdrop of nationwide protests over systemic racism and police brutality, and a global pandemic forcing the world into lockdown for months. 6lack is used to recording songs at light speed (he told XXL in 2016 that he made over 200 songs in a year’s time) but these days, “it’s been a compressed amount because of how much shit has been going on in the world and all the information I have to process,” he tells me over Zoom. “As much as I would’ve loved to have been solid on what I was going through, I was all over the place. That’s why I try to take time to decompress and figure out how I feel about where I am in life, sort through emotions, and then get back to making music.”

Not one to hold onto music for too long, 6lack felt it was time to repay his antsy fans for their patience. This EP is a six-piece appetizer to satisfy their cravings until a third album materializes. “There’s a lot of things I still want to learn and practice before I pump out this next album,” he says. On Instagram, he issued a call to action encouraging fans to “turn on your post notifications. it’s new music season,” and on Friday, June 26, 6lack returned with 6pc Hot—named after hot wings, his favorite comfort food—featuring “six different songs, six different emotions, six different thoughts, six different experiences that I felt during quarantine.”

Van Nguyen

The number six also happens to be his Life Path number and a running theme in his life, from his moniker (pronounced “black”) to his daughter’s name Syx. During the lowest moment of his life, he stumbled upon Life Path numbers and immediately resonated with the number six, as sixes are “people who are here of service, people who are here to help, to nurture, and are the caretakers of the world,” he explains. Perhaps one of the most influential sixes in his life, though, is Zone 6, a blanket term for the Eastside district of Atlanta and the area that launched the careers of fellow Atlantans Gucci Mane and Future.

Born Ricardo Valentine Jr. in Baltimore, Maryland, 6lack later moved to Atlanta at the age of five. There, he cut his teeth as a battle rapper in school, going up against anyone who dared question his lyrical dexterity, including a pre-fame Young Thug. Battle rapping soon lost its spark, forcing 6lack to express himself through other art forms. He turned to singing, which would prove to be a worthy career change years down the line, though a 2011 record deal from Flo Rida’s International Music Group botched his early momentum; he made several songs with little pay or success. The budding musician’s big break came in 2016, when LoveRenaissance signed him. He released his breakout single “PRBLMS” to fanfare, and his debut album Free 6lack quickly crowned him the artist to watch.

On Free 6lack, he introduced fans to his perennial themes of hustling, romance, lust, and heartbreak, straddling the line between rapper and singer over dark melodies and murky trap drums that have become integral to Atlanta sound. East Atlanta Love Letter two years later boasted features from J. Cole, Offset, and Future and served as a reminder that 6lack can exercise his rap skills as easily as he delivers his sultry coos. He doesn’t return to his old music often, but admits he’d like to “create a space for [rap] in what I do now, whether it’s dedicating an album to rap, or giving people more rap moments.”

Like the flavorful dish it’s named after, 6pc Hot is short (in run time) and imparts a sticky hit with 6lack’s usual brooding; the nocturnal R&B vibe and lovelorn ballads are reminiscent of its predecessors. Then there’s the kick: 6pc Hot doubles down on 6lack’s commitment to giving rap more of a supporting role on his projects. Brag-rap track “Atlanta Freestyle” opens the project, taking listeners on a tour of 6lack’s hometown mainstays, from rappers Nudy, Gucci Mane, and Skooly to Ann’s Snack Bar in the Kirkwood neighborhood, “where the food real good.” He connects with fellow Atlanta native Lil Baby on “Know Your Rights,” a nod to Colin Kaepernick’s social justice campaign of the same name, and proves he’s a lover boy at his core with “Long Nights.” As Ari Lennox delivers soulful, acrobatic ad libs in the background, 6lack details his desire to kiss the Fenty Beauty gloss off his lady’s lips.

“Each album is me updating people on where I am and how I feel, and love is something I find easy to write about,” he says. “It’s the core of everything we do. The way I see it, there are only three things I ultimately want to do in life: do what I love, love someone, and create a life I love. That’s what we’re here for—to love.”

As smooth as he is when penning songs about his feelings, he admits it’s not easy to communicate his words IRL—but if he has to text a paragraph, he will. What he doesn’t find difficult is speaking up about social issues, especially in the current climate, where Black people feel hopeless in the face of racism at every turn. Reading the news, watching broadcast news segments, and aimlessly scrolling on social media feeds are constant visual reminders that America is just now waking up to its racism. Black people are experiencing several pandemics simultaneously.

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6lack encourages everyone to find their role in the movement. “Sometimes it’s being on the internet and speaking on things that other people can receive and digest,” he says. “It might be funding a movement I can’t physically be on the ground with. And then sometimes it might be actually stepping outside and going to a march.” Or sometimes, it’s starting a virtual platform that expands the fan experience while amplifying Black businesses. Launched in tandem with the EP’s release, 6lackbox is an online hub that doubles as a social impact resource platform—including links that direct users to a voter registration site and a list of Black businesses to support—and a one-stop source where fans can access unreleased music, photos, merch, and more. And yes, it carries his very own hot sauce, 600 Degrees by 6lack. “It’s more on the good-tasting side than the spicy side—it reminds me of Louisiana-style hot sauce,” he says. But it’s not too hot. “I’d give it a 6/10 on the spicy scale.” The weekend 6pc Hot dropped, 6lack partnered with Postmates to deliver hot wings from Atlanta’s Good Fellas restaurant as part of his 6lack on Black Business initiative. He’ll also partner with Amazon to debut “6lackcards,” which will come preloaded with money for business owners to cover any expenses.

“It’s easy to post a tweet or post a message in solidarity, but after you put money towards things, where’s the action?” he adds. As brands rush to make Black people a priority in the midst of worldwide movements affirming Black lives and condemning white supremacy, 6lack advises them to embrace discomfort. “It’s a completely different thing to sit down and actually have the difficult conversations” he says. “It’s a different thing to actually start to employ people that look different than the majority. Actions are really all that can be done at this point.”

We end our Zoom call discussing the final song on his EP, “Outside.” The ultimate quarantine tune, it captures the loneliness that’s been looming since lockdown began. “I’ll meet someone I can play with/When it’s time to go outside and play again,” he sings. 6lack’s already planning a trip to an amusement park once it’s really safe to travel again. “I need a thrill. Maybe Six Flags.” For now, Big Bear Lake will suffice. Cabin fever hasn’t struck yet.

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Spoilers for Hulu’s The Great, below.

My rapturous two-day binge of Hulu’s The Great was immediately followed by the sinking feeling that a second season could be years away. The series, which stars Elle Fanning as Catherine the Great and Nicholas Hoult as Peter III, is the chaotic, violent, sensual, unhinged relative of Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette and Yorgos Lanthimos’s The Favourite. Tony McNamara, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter behind the latter, previously hadn’t confirmed his latest show would extend beyond its 10 delicious episodes.

But, huzzah, Hulu confirmed that a second season of The Great is on the way. Ahead, everything we know about the status of season 2—and a case for why The Great deserves one.

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A second season has been confirmed.

The show tells a revisionist history of the 18th-century Russian rulers’ rocky marriage, and it was initially reported as a limited series. But by the end of the finale, the Empress has only sampled her first taste of power. “This season doesn’t end the way you think it’s going to end,” Fanning admitted to Entertainment Tonight. “[Tony]’s definitely thinking about [season 2]. He has some idea.” Luckily, Hulu confirmed that Catherine and co. will return for a second 10-episode installment.

Both of the show’s lead actors previously teased their involvement with another season. Without divulging details, Fanning previously confirmed to ET: “If they wanted to do it, I would do it right away.” It also seemed that Hoult was already involved. Variety reported the actor exited the upcoming seventh Mission Impossible movie because filming “overlapped with the production of season 2 of The Great.”

All the main cast members will likely return—with one major exception.

For a show full of bloodshed, the central characters remain alive at the end of season 1. Those likely to return include Fanning as Catherine, Hoult as Peter, Phoebe Fox as Catherine’s maid Marial, Sacha Dhawan as bureaucrat Orlov, Adam Godley as religious advisor Archie, Gwilym Lee as Peter’s right-hand man Grigor Dymov, Charity Wakefield as Peter’s frequent mistress Georgina, Belinda Bromilow as the colorful Aunt Elizabeth, and Douglas Hodge as General Velementov. However, Catherine’s lover Leo (Sebastian De Souza) may have met his death. (Though we don’t see his demise onscreen, so anything is possible.)

Ollie Upton

The first season ends with a heartbreaking cliffhanger.

The Great‘s finale follows Catherine on her 20th birthday. As a present to herself, she decides to toss aside her meticulous months of planning by making a last-minute decision to kill Peter that day. Meanwhile, Peter is grappling with the fact that he may actually love his wife, and is determined to get her to say it back to him by day’s end.

In other events, Aunt Elizabeth realizes Catherine’s plans to overthrow Peter. While distressed, she doesn’t rat her out to the Emperor. “Most women die with an unsaid better idea in their hearts,” she concludes. General Velementov prematurely begins the coup, soldiers in tow. Plus, Orlo and Archie physically fight each other for power.

Ollie Upton

Catherine’s plans to eliminate Peter are complicated by his birthday gift to her—a visit from her idol, Voltaire (Dustin Demri-Burns). “You are the oddest of creatures,” she tells her husband afterwards. “Cruel and thoughtless, tender, entertaining, and bizarre—I’m fond of you. In some ways, you break my heart.” When Catherine lunges forward with a knife to kill Peter, he misinterprets her coup attempt as foreplay. But that confusion is set right when Marial tells Peter of his wife’s plan—and reveals Catherine is pregnant with his heir.

In the end, it’s a love story—his for her and hers for Russia. As Peter holds a knife to Catherine’s throat, they bargain about the fate of the country and their relationship. “You love me and you love Paul,” she says, naming their unborn child in an attempt to win his sympathy. “You won’t kill us.” Peter won’t, but he will ask that Catherine end the coup or lose Leo, her assigned companion turned real-life lover. After consulting Voltaire, Catherine sacrifices Leo for the sake of her adopted country. Catherine and Peter are bonded by mutual delusions—his that she will fall in love with him, hers that he’ll allow her to rule.

Ollie Upton

There’s much more of Catherine the Great’s story to explore.

From the beginning, The Great does not purport to be a historically accurate retelling of Catherine the Great’s life. A title card at the beginning of each episode reads “*an occasionally true story.” Based on McNamara’s 2008 play of the same name, The Great is the kind of period piece where every character inexplicably speaks in a British accent.

But despite the creative liberties (Catherine was 14 when she married Peter, not 19, and she lived with him for decades before staging her coup, not six months), there’s still much to her story. For one, Catherine didn’t rise to power until after the birth of her son Paul, a storyline teased in the finale. And she reigned for 34 years, so there’s a lot of content to dig into.

Ollie Upton

Executive producer Marian Macgowan said they had mapped out several seasons of the show. “We initially pitched six seasons. So we believe there’s sufficient material to take us through until she is an old woman,” Macgowan told Decider. When Fanning was asked about the timeline for season 2 by Entertainment Weekly, she confirmed it would pick-up with the characters at a similar age. (No The Crown casting changes here.)

It’ll likely be years before season 2 of The Great hits the screen.

Before opening your stash of macaroons and breaking glasses, we must remember the state of the world. It will likely take more than a year before we get our promised second season. The first was ordered in February 2019 and didn’t debut until May 2020. Plus, nearly every film or TV production is delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ollie Upton

Until then, we’ll just rewatch Catherine teaching Peter how to say touché.

Stream season 1 of The Great now.

Sign up for Hulu here or as part of the Disney+ bundle here.

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If you were once a member of the masses willing to sacrifice your firstborn for a ticket to see Broadway’s Hamilton, yearn no longer. Beginning July 3 on Disney+, there’s a seat for you in the room where the award-winning musical happens. Hamilton will hit the streaming service more than a year ahead of its original October 2021 release date—and not a moment too soon.

The hip-hop musical about the founding fathers arrives just in time for the Fourth of July weekend, after being announced back in February. Thomas Kail, who helmed the original Broadway show, will direct this filmed version. And stage show purists, rest easy: You’ll see the Tony, Grammy, and Pulitzer Prize-winning show with its full original cast. Miranda, the creator and titular star of Hamilton, stars in the filmed production and will be joined by Tony winners Leslie Odom, Jr. as Aaron Burr, Daveed Diggs as the Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson, and Renée Elise Goldsberry as Angelica Schuyler. Tony nominees Christopher Jackson as George Washington, Jonathan Groff as King George, and Phillipa Soo as Eliza Hamilton also return.

Here’s how to see the groundbreaking musical that reinvented history.

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How do I watch Hamilton on Disney+?

The filmed version of Hamilton will be available exclusively on Disney+ at midnight PST or 3 a.m. EST, Miranda clarified on Twitter. There’s no need to scramble to watch the whole thing right away (although we’re all tempted). Miranda assured anxious viewers that his career-defining work won’t be leaving the internet any time soon. “You will just have it,” he wrote. “For as many times as you like, right next to A Goofy Movie and Talespin and An Extremely Goofy Movie…”

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If you have a Disney+ account already, the show is free to you at the aforementioned date and time. For those who need access, you’ll need to formally sign up for the streaming service. (The previous free trial period is over for the moment.) You can sign up for Disney+ here. Plans include $6.99/month or $69.99/year. There is also a bundle featuring Disney+, ESPN+ and Hulu for $12.99/month. No matter which plan you choose, it’s guaranteed to be less than the price of a Broadway ticket.

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Will there be any watch parties or special features?

Funny you should ask: Both an official Twitter watch party and virtual roundtable featuring the cast have been confirmed. During a recent Good Morning America interview, Miranda opened up about filming Hamilton at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in June 2016. He revealed that the actors shot the stage show with cameras in the audience over the course of a Sunday matinee, Monday day off, and Tuesday evening performance. “So it was basically a three-day film shoot with the best-rehearsed cast in the history of the movies because we’d all been doing the show for a year at this point,” Miranda said.

More behind-the-scenes insights are sure to be uncovered in the official cast watch party on Twitter. That will take place on Friday, July 3 at 7 p.m. EST/ 4 p.m. PST with the hashtag #Hamilfilm for following along. Fans can also watch a complimentary virtual roundtable, Hamilton In-Depth, with team Hamilton and host Kelley Carter, on Disney+ and TheUndefeated.com.

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Other orders of business Miranda noted on Twitter: he cut two “fucks” from the show to ensure a PG-13 rating; the cast bows will be included; subtitles in other languages will be coming soon; and there will be a countdown clock for intermission between acts one and two—so snack and bathroom breaks are encouraged.

Sign up for Disney+

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In April, as New York City emerged as the epicenter of the Covid-19 pandemic, the U.S. military deployed 720 troops to work in the city’s overburdened medical centers. One such service member is 36-year-old Rosa Blackdeer, a registered nurse and First Lieutenant in the Air Force Reserves, who left her family behind in Wisconsin to serve at Lincoln Medical Center, a public hospital in the Bronx that is home to the busiest emergency department in NYC. Here is her story, told in her own words:

New York City was supposed to be the destination of our family summer vacation this year. I arrived on April 5. My unit is staying at a hotel in Times Square. I’ve never been here before, but from watching movies and TV shows, I know what it’s supposed to look like, and it is crazy to see everything empty. It’s like a Walking Dead episode.

My alarm goes off at 5 a.m. I heat up oatmeal in my microwave for breakfast. I got one for my room because otherwise there’s only one microwave for like 20 floors. Then, I make a sack lunch: a sandwich, an apple, and some grapes. I don’t want to eat or prep food anywhere else but here.

Then, I get my scrubs on and pack a bag with my nursing shoes, goggles, booties, head cover, and my N95, which I carry in a Tupperware container. We’re able to get four N95s per person at a time; we number them and rotate through them, letting them airdry to kill the virus between wears. I hang mine on little plastic hooks I stuck to the back of my hotel room door. I wear one surgical mask when I leave my room and take an extra; we wear them on top of our N95s all day. Sometimes the hospital has them, but right now we’re getting them from the military. We meet downstairs once a week and our supervisor hands us the masks we need for the week. I wish I had a whole box of them. We’ve also had our families and hospitals back home send us supplies. But otherwise we’ve been googling stuff to buy online, just like everybody else.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

At 5:45 a.m. I meet my buddy, a woman from my unit named Kristy, and we walk to the Javits Center together to catch a bus to the hospital. It’s dark and cold walking there and you never know what you’re going to find. One day there was a big pile of human feces on the sidewalk and I was like, Oh, that’s great. Welcome to New York.

My husband was in the military for eight years, so he knows what it feels like when orders come down. I told him I had to leave in the morning and at first he was like, “What?!” But then he said, “Okay.” My husband works at a gym as a personal trainer, but he got laid off because of Covid; we have two kids, ages 13 and 14, and a foster child, a five-year-old that we just got in August. When I deployed in the past, my kids were babies and didn’t know. They just thought, Mommy has gone away. But now, it’s a very different experience because they’re like, “Wait. Hold on. You’re going to Ground Zero?” So, it’s harder on them, but I think the kids were mostly concerned that “Dad only makes us pizza.” But I told them they’d be fine, and I’m very proud of my husband—he’s doing pretty good.

When we board the bus, everyone is like, “Ready to do this?” and we’re like, “Yeah, here we go again.” We take two buses so everyone gets their own seat, for safety. Before I get off the bus, I put my N95 on because sometimes there are patients or homeless people waiting near the hospital entrance. I don’t like to put my N95 on any sooner than I have to, though, because my nose is pretty messed up from it—irritated, red, and sore. Sometimes I want to put a Band-Aid on it, but I’m also scared. Is it going to mess up the seal?

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

We get to Lincoln around 6:40 a.m. The hospital looks so dreary when we’re walking in. After I’m inside, the first hand sanitizer dispenser I get to is empty.

I am working on a floor that was created maybe two days before I got here. It’s the third new unit the hospital has created to treat Covid-19 patients. We’re trying to do our best, but the floor used to be a clinic and really wasn’t created for in-patient care, so we’re running back and forth constantly trying to find everything we need. I am typically assigned to four patients and there are about 25 in total, which is a lot of patients for a unit that shouldn’t really exist.

Ninety-five percent of my patients have tested positive for Covid-19. There are about 35 people from my unit that got sent to Lincoln and no one has come down with symptoms yet, so that’s good. But it’s hard too because we’re putting ourselves on the front line and the enemy is invisible. In war, you can tell who the enemy is—here, you can’t see it. It’s like, did I touch something wrong? Did I put mask on differently? The anxiety that comes with that is hard. Once, someone coughed in my face and I thought I felt it go through my goggles. The mental drainage is intense, like, Oh my god, I hope I didn’t just get it.We’re all scared. We see who this virus is affecting—young or old, it doesn’t matter. I come to work every day and I don’t know if that’s the day I’m going to get it or not.

I eat my lunch in the breakroom, but it just doesn’t look clean. The table is sticky so I always bring my own Clorox wipes to wipe everything down before I eat. I don’t feel like it’s really a break because I have to pay attention, like, oh my god, did I touch something?

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

I was stationed in Balad, Iraq in 2009 for six months. Back then, I was a med tech and we did a lot of patient transfers to hospitals in Germany and elsewhere. We had busy days—sometimes we moved like 50 patients a night, busting our butts, carrying 200-plus pound guys—but it’s definitely a different busy here because our patients decline so quickly. One minute they’re breathing well and then all of a sudden it’s like, Oh my god, what just happened? Supply-wise, it’s the same. We always have issues with supplies, so I’m used to being creative. We call it MacGyver nursing.

The work hits me harder here because it’s right on our own soil. At least when I’m in a war, I know everyone there signed on the dotted line saying they are going to fight for our country. You’re expecting mass casualties and bodies to be coming in because that’s the environment you’re in. You don’t expect that when you’re stateside. I’m treating civilians who could be my family. In fact, most nurses on my floor are from New York, so this is their home and they are losing family members. Nurses have died who were working at Lincoln. It definitely feels like I’m in a warzone sometimes.

One that hit me hard was a 94-year-old woman. We knew she wasn’t going to make it. Some people say it’s easier when it’s an older person, but it’s still hard, especially now when they don’t have family with them. We were trying to talk to her every chance we got. I would talk to her about the weather and hold her hand if I had time. When she started to go, I had to run and get the doctor to see if there was anything else we should do. I had to leave, but I didn’t want her to die by herself. So as I was running out the door, I said to a colleague, “Please, just go in there and hold her hand.” Nobody should die by themselves.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

I’m a manager at the hospital where I work in Wisconsin. Before I left home, 11 people had tested positive for Covid-19 in our little small town of about 3,000 people. I told everybody, “Hey, we’re going to make it through. The need is greater somewhere else.”

The deaths really weighed on the members of my unit when we first got here. We’re not used to seeing so many. What we decided to do is, whenever we have a death, regardless of how busy we are, we all get together in that room and we say thank you to the team. “Thank you for doing your part. Regardless of what happened, we know you did your best to keep them alive.” We were there for these patients even when their families couldn’t be and it’s important to acknowledge that. We have a moment of silence, and then we move on with our days.

Sometimes you have patients who you don’t think are going to make it, and they do. One time I had a patient who was 68 or 69 years old with three or four comorbidities and I really didn’t think she was going to pull through. She had a high fever for two days and I had icepacks on her everywhere, but it was getting to the point where there was nothing I could do to make her more comfortable. I felt really defeated because usually there’s always something else you can do. Every time I would go into her room, it was horrible because she’d be like, “Just let me die. I can’t do this anymore.” I was like, “No, you can. We’re going to try our best to make it through this.” She’s like, “No, just let me die.” And I’m like, “Yes, we can. We’re strong.”

When I came back to work for my next shift a few days later, she was doing much better. Her fever was lower, she was talking more and even laughing. She wasn’t my patient anymore, but you get used to these patients when you have them for a while. Not to say they’re family, but you have a connection. So I was still checking on her. I asked her if she knew who I was because sometimes patients with high fevers don’t remember things. She was like, “Yeah, didn’t I tell you to let me die?” And I’m like, “Yeah, aren’t you glad I didn’t listen to you?” She’s like, “Oh yes,” chuckling. She said she couldn’t believe she made it through. She was eventually able to go home. I really didn’t know if she was going to be a success story or not, but she made it. I was like, you have got to be kidding me—I was so happy.

We got to see one of our patients get extubated the other day, which was a big deal because not too many patients who get intubated survive. He was only 37. It takes a while for all of the medication to wear off in the body. It was a rough few days, but he came back little by little. He even walked to the wheelchair by himself when it was finally time for him to be discharged. We got him a card and some balloons, and we got ourselves some little pompoms and lined up on either side of the hallway to cheer for him as he was wheeled out. We were so excited for him to go home. Anytime our patients are looking better from one day to another, we get so happy. You would think you’re giving us candy.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

A lot of things that should be easy take longer here. The pharmacy is so overwhelmed that it can take over three hours to get medications. Some of my patients weren’t getting their morning meds until almost noon. It’s hard to work at a big hospital period, let alone at a big hospital with three new units of patients and the same number of pharmacists.

Another issue is we aren’t allowed to wear stethoscopes because of the risks of contamination. Every patient is supposed to have one in their rooms, but that is not always true and it’s really hard to do my job without one. I have to ask, “How do you think you’re breathing? Do you feel like it’s getting better?” I feel defeated because I don’t always have what I need to help someone. It’s hard not to take that feeling with you. Even when you’ve done everything possible, it sucks sometimes because you know you could have done better if you had the right supplies.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

I hand off my patients around 6:40 p.m. and get ready to head back to my hotel. Once we’re on the bus, we’re all talking about what to order for dinner and texting with our colleagues back at the hotel. The members of our unit who have the day off are responsible for ordering for the group each day—that’s how we take care of each other.

When I get to my room, I take my shoes off and my other shoes out of my bag and spray both with Lysol and leave them in the hallway. Then I take a Clorox wipe to open and close the door. I take off my scrubs off—I have a laundry bag right by the door to put them in—and hang my N95 mask up to dry. Then, I go to the sink, wash my hands, and get in the shower.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

By the time I’m clean, the pizza has arrived and my unit has set up a buffet in the hallway for family dinner. We Lysol the floor before we sit down and try not to touch anything. We’re like, eww, but sitting on the floor in the hall to have dinner together is still better than eating alone. We vent; we talk about the good and bad parts of our days. We know it’s not good to keep it all in, so it’s like our family therapy. We give only so much time to vent, and then we’re like “No more work talk!” And then we shift to our kids and spouses, or what we might do on a day off. One night we did sheet masks after dinner.

Sometimes, we’re speechless. We walked into the worst thing any of us have ever seen in the United States. Every day, you’re just going, going, going, and not seeing patients get better. The first weeks we were here, there wasn’t a day that when by that we didn’t have a death on the floor. One day we ran out of body bags. Another day there wasn’t anyone available to come pick up the deceased, so we had a dead body in a patient room next to a live patient for like six to eight hours. We’re just like, “This sucks!” There’s nothing else to say.

After I got my orders to go to New York back in April, I went to Walmart and bought what I thought I would need: Lysol spray, disinfecting wipes, etc. I also bought a pinata and some candy. When I got home, my kids helped me pack—I made a checklist so everyone could be involved. And then we went outside and hit the heck out of a pinata and celebrated everyone’s birthday, so I wouldn’t miss them.

Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force/Army Corporal Rachel Thicklin

In those first weeks, after work, I came into my room and cried in the shower. I cried again while talking to my husband. And then you just wake up the next morning and do it all again. I never thought in my whole career that I would see something like this. When I talk to my nurses back home and they ask how it’s going, I’m like, “I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy.” I hope I never have to deal with something like this again.

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