<p><span style="background-color: rgba(213, 243, 229, 1)">An essential worker in Israel writes of day-to-day life in the first year of the pandemic. Walking through empty streets, navigating mazes of masks, lockdowns, and ever-changing regulations, he chronicles the uncertain fates of his city's people and businesses, his family's experiences in assisted living at the nearby House of a Hundred Grandmothers, and, at his office, the ritual of the Afternoon Prayers.</span></p><p><br></p>