The day the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic — March 11, 2020 — happened to be our 41st wedding anniversary. The virus then forced my wife Elvira and I to live apart from each other for the next 18 months — I in New York City, she in Italy, the two worldwide epicenters.
But luckily, I developed a survival strategy: I talked money with her. Oh, we talked family, too, as well as friends, food and, yes, our apocalyptic reckoning with microbes. But I talked money more than I ever had in my 68 years.
