“It’s a very freaky situation. ... Life in the condo has totally changed,”
Two City Plaza resident Hank Kucine said.
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Since Coronavirus restrictions prohibit them from having visitors, Stan and Yvette Yoslov host a virtual cocktail party in their condo at Two City Plaza via the Zoom app with Marjie and Dr, Shelley Konigsberg of North Palm Beach and Nedda and Larry Pollack of Palm Beach. |
But, unlike people sequestered in single-family homes, condo dwellers at TCP
and elsewhere throughout Palm Beach County can’t retreat to a spacious
backyard with a private pool and flower garden.
“It feels like we’re in jail,” said Juan Orellana, who shares a
1,095-square-foot unit with his wife at Prado Condominium in downtown West
Palm Beach. “I am so envious of people who have a backyard.”
The pinch particularly stings condo residents over the age of 65 who are
following the coronavirus-prevention advice of the county’s health director
and staying home at all times.
“We are constrained and we feel a little bit of cabin fever,” said Deepak
Laroia, 71, who shares a 1,400-square-foot condo on the 12th floor of TCP
with his wife, “but things could be a lot
worse.”
They might feel like passengers on a cruise ship that’s stuck on land, but
they’re certainly not the only ones feeling the COVID-19 social squeeze.
The pandemic struck just as West Palm Beach’s skyline was transforming,
reflecting a shift to a more densely populated downtown. The Bristol, a
25-story luxury condo tower along the Intracoastal Waterway, sold dozens of
high-end units last year, some to wealthy buyers who traded Palm Beach
estates for more compact quarters.
Meanwhile, a new generation of high-rise apartment buildings in downtown
West Palm Beach has added more than 1,000 units to the city’s urban core. A
similar trend played out in downtown Boca Raton, which also has seen a boom
in vertical construction.
Now, as boards impose more and more safety restrictions, many of the nearly
187,000 condo units across Palm Beach County, like millions of condo
dwellers worldwide, are being forced to adapt to the unique challenges of
confinement in a communal environment.
‘Promised not to breathe’
Many condo neighbors, some physically separated from each other by a just
few hundreds yards down the hall, are using the internet and texting to stay
connected. They’re hosting virtual cocktail parties and attending online
religious services using the Zoom app. Living rooms floors are used for
pushups, situps and squats.
The book club at Two City Plaza, which usually gathers in The Club Room or a
resident’s unit, will hold its next meeting in April online via Zoom. The
guest will be TCP resident Michael McAuliffe, the former Palm Beach County
state attorney, who will discuss his recent novel “No Truth Left To Tell.”
But a trip to the grocery store or the simple activity of going outside for
a walk often comes with new, unsettling routines: Wearing protective gloves,
or using room keys or tissue, just to press the elevator buttons.
Once inside the elevator, masked passengers stand at opposite corners,
eyeing each other with suspicion or breaking the uneasy silence with gallows
humor.
“The other day, my wife Rita and I got on an elevator and there was a man in
it who promised not to breathe until we reached the lobby. It was a joke,
but I found myself holding my breath for eight floors,” said Thomas Madden,
a public relations consultant who lives in The Chalfonte at Boca Raton.
“We’re all sort of looking at each other, wondering, trying to judge how
healthy someone is,” he said, “and we dare not cough or it could start a
stampede.”
Until March 30, Two City Plaza residents could still take in the spectacular
views from the spacious rooftop, which encompasses the building’s footprint
between Olive Avenue and Dixie Highway just north of Okeechobee Boulevard.
But if they wanted to sit where the outdoor furniture used to be (it is now
in storage to avoid the risk of COVID-19 spread), they had to carry up their
own lawn chairs on the freight elevator. Now, that’s closed, along with the
sauna and steam room.
Rediscovering balconies
Many dwellers are rediscovering their condo balconies, some of which had
been occupied by potted plants more than people before COVID-19 became a
household name. Others are re-reading books, cleaning out closets and
venturing outdoors only for groceries.
“It’s very boring. You watch a lot of TV,” said Kucine, who shares a
1,200-square-foot condo with his wife, Zandra.
“Everyone is afraid of contracting coronavirus. And as you watch TV,
inevitably, like driving on the highway and seeing a car wreck, you are
fascinated by the news, even though you really don’t want to watch it.”
The Kucines are immersing themselves in spy novels. Hank used to take his
book to the rooftop, with a cigar and folding chair. The new rooftop
prohibition has forced him to his condo unit’s balcony, Zandra’s reading
spot.
“Luckily, through no intelligence of my own, I happened to go to the library
before it closed and I took out five books,” Hank said. “After that, we will
have to re-read whatever we already have.”
On the other side of downtown, residents in The Edge, a 16-story condo tower
east of Clear Lake on Australian Avenue, lost access to the pool on March
30, following an order from West Palm Beach Mayor Keith James.
The gym and clubhouse closed a week earlier. Packages are delivered to a
neutral room in the lobby, accessed by a key fob and an emailed security
code, without any personal interaction between resident and courier.
“The only thing that I’m remotely upset about is the food deliveries not
being allowed to be brought directly to my door,” said Anne Hoffarth, who
shares a 900-square-foot unit on the third floor with Ellie, a French
bulldog puppy.
“I tend to order in when I’m feeling lazy,” Hoffarth, 30, said in an email.
“That kind of defeats the point of being lazy if I have to get dressed and
make my way downstairs to the front and back up again, lol.”
Dogs don’t do social distancing
Then there’s the challenge of taking dogs out for walks and bathroom breaks.
As owners try to practice social distancing, dogs stretch their leashes to
the max for up-close-and-personal pet interactions.
“When I use the elevator, I tend to use my elbow, the fob, my knuckle to
press the buttons. And then I just try to wash my hands once I get back to
my unit,” Hoffarth, said the other day after returning from a walk with
Ellie.
“The poop trash cans have lids you’re supposed to lift open. One more
compromise.”
There’s a dog-walking park, with grass, that’s still open on the rooftop at
Two City Plaza. But many residents, some wearing face masks, journey to the
street to take their dogs for strolls along the Flagler Drive waterfront.
“My wife makes me carry a Clorox wipe,” said Michael Maschio, a 73-year-old
cancer survivor who wears a face mask while walking Sheldon, a gentle cocker
spaniel.
As Maschio was returning to Two City Plaza, two neighbors were venturing out
of the garage on bicycles.
“I ain’t afraid of no virus,” Bruce Behrstock said, using the same cadence
from the famous line of the “Ghostbusters” theme song.
He and neighbor Keith Rockwell both said they were taking precautions. But
they also refuse to be held hostage during their self-imposed condo
quarantines, regardless of health director Alina Alonso’s repeated pleas for
people over 64 to stay home.
“If you’ve got to be quarantined,” Behrstock said before riding off on his
bike, “doing it in paradise isn’t so bad.”
Praise for condo management
Other than the residents who briefly protested when the TCP fitness center
closed on March 16, there have been few complaints about the restrictions.
In fact, many condo dwellers are praising the building’s management and
staff.
“Our management has done an excellent job in thinking of the safety of the
staff and the residents,” said Lin Irey, who shares a 1,461-square-foot unit
on the sixth floor with her husband, Ger Eubank.
“We are all in this together,” she said, “and the only way this will stop is
for everyone to use common sense.”
In Boca Raton, Madden said he thinks most people in the twin 22-story condo
towers at The Chalfonte have welcomed the restrictions. And he said
residents have taken notice of extra cleaning measures in common areas.
“Sometimes when I get off the elevator and see one of the masked cleaning
people pointing a vacuum cleaner rod,” said Madden, who writes a blog, “I
hold up my hands like I’m under arrest, which gets a muffled chuckle.”
At Two City Plaza, Yvette and Stan Yoslov are content to stay inside; their
condo has 2,100 square feet, 14-foot ceilings and five balconies. “I never
used any of them until last week,” Stan, 83, said of the multiple balconies.
The Yoslovs miss going to the Kravis Center and movies. Also canceled: A
planned vacation this fall to northern Italy, where the pandemic has killed
thousands.
The last trip they took? China, where the coronavirus was first detected in
December. They returned home in September. “We seem to be lucky with
travel,” Yvette said.
In many parts of China, high-rise residents have their temperatures taken
when they leave the building and upon their return. They exit lobbies by
walking across a thick plastic mat covered with a bleach solution.
The Yoslovs hope it never gets that serious at Two City Plaza. But while
they welcome safety restrictions, they dearly miss visitors.
“I really would enjoy having friends from another building come over and
visit us,” Yvette said, “but at same time it’s getting to the point where
this virus is getting too scary.”
Like many condo dwellers, the Yoslovs are improvising.
“We had a Zoom cocktail party the other night,” Yvette said. “We have three
couples, one in North Palm Beach and one in Palm Beach. Each of the women
prepared appetizers. At 5 o’clock we all met online so we could see each
other and chat.”
The party chat led to a discussion about the last time anyone could remember
living through something like COVID-19.
“We are all in the same age range,” Yvette, 79, said. “One girl remembers a
summer when polio was prevalent and you were no longer allowed to go to
pools or parks or play with other kids.”
For Hank and Zandra Kucine, the pandemic has brought back memories of living
in Manhattan during the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks nearly 20 years ago.
“Our apartment was on the 37th floor and we unfortunately watched the fires
burn in the towers,” he said. “We put duct tape around the windows but it
did nothing. The dust came in and you realize you’re walking around in it.
“We collected bottled water and brought it to the police. You’d see people
walking around with photographs in their hands and asking, ‘Have you seen
this person?’ You didn’t know what to say. So you say, ‘No, but If I see
them I will get in touch with you.’
“That was truly horrific. This is the second truly horrific experience of my
life, but I don’t know that one can be compared with the other. That was an
isolated place and this is
(affecting) the entire world.”
Odd ‘sense of community’
COVID-19 has given the Kucines another dose of anxiety, one that has helped
put their condo restrictions in perspective: Their daughter is a doctor in
Manhattan, working on the front lines of the pandemic.
“A frightening situation,” he said. “She is dedicated to what she does. She
has to deal with a much more difficult situation than what we are enduring
here.”
Until the pandemic subsides, TCP residents are trying to make the best of a
crisis that, despite its imposed physical separations, has brought many of
them closer in spirit.
“Of course, it’s an inconvenience for everybody, but you feel a sense of
community, you feel you are going through it with others alongside you,”
said Laroia, who is enjoying his12th-floor balcony.
“Obviously I am more or less restrained to the limits of my condo, but I can
still see the Intracoastal. I can still see the world.”
He added, “We just have to be patient and ride this through.”