La Jolla Historical Society seeks stories for ‘Corona Chronicles’

Are you one of the millions binge-watching Netflix’s “Tiger King” while sheltering-in-place?

Or are you taking the opportunity to learn a new language?

Whatever you’re doing with your time during the COVID-19 stay-at-home order, the La Jolla Historical Society wants your stories for a new project dubbed “The Corona Chronicles.”

The Chronicles will become a collection of anecdotes encapsulating what La Jollans did while homebound in 2020, and the collection will be stored in the Historical Society archives.

“This is a historic moment,” said La Jolla Historical Society executive director Heath Fox. “A pandemic of this nature has not happened in 100 years and so we’re collecting stories from people living through this today. You are under a stay-at-home order, so tell us what staying at home is like. How are you feeling about the experience?”

The format is open-ended, but much of the dozen or so responses that have come in thus far have been written prose.

“But we would accept poetry, relevant photographs, and if someone were to create artwork, we would accept a photograph of that,” Fox said. “Anything that shows how La Jollans are responding to domestic life.”

The following set of prompts are intended to guide responses, but all submissions are welcome:

How’s morale? In this strange and uncertain time, how do you feel about the curtailing of social interaction? What is your experience practicing social distancing? What do you most fear? How are you adapting? Do you have examples of how the community is coming together?

What are you reading? With more than the usual amount of time at home, what’s on your reading list this spring? Do you have a favorite genre or author? What’s been your favorite book?

What are you watching? Are you spending more time in front of the flat-screen? What movies have you seen ... or plan to watch? How about television series? Any favorite episodes, or ones you’re looking forward to?

How’s your garden? Some nice rains lately, and the wisteria is in bloom here at the Historical Society. How about your garden? Is it in good shape? Any new plantings in mind this year? Perhaps you’re working on an updated design plan you could tell us about?

What are you cooking? With a little more time at home just now, are you cooking more? What are your comfort foods? Share your favorite recipes.

Share a memory. Are you a La Jolla native? A San Diego native? Recall a favorite memory of growing up in the community. Are you a transplant? Remember your first impressions of moving here? Send a story about your experience.

Fox said the benefit he sees from this project is two-fold: “For the people who are interested and want to submit, it is something for them to do that is productive and contributes to the community.

“For the La Jolla Historical Society, it is an opportunity to collect stories from people that we can archive and make available for future historians and researchers. It’s a good piece of history for us to capture and share in some form and create a historical record in the longer term.”

Got something to contribute? E-mail your submission to info@lajollahistory.org