Home Posts tagged "covid-19" (Page 2)

Tag: covid-19

Week Sixteen

Following on KD’s post from last time, here’s an update on the state of me… It’s Week Sixteen since everything shut down here. My part of the world is doing well (according to our top scientists) and a gradual reopening is underway, but our case numbers are far from zero, so I’m continuing to behave as if it isn’t. Going into places of business makes me really anxious, even though I wear a mask and am careful about hand hygiene. So no restaurant patios, minimal public transit use, and I haven’t been more than a ten-minute walk from home in I don’t know how long. As an introvert and highly sensitive person, I’m perfectly happy not going downtown to work three or four days a week – I used to crave being at home more, and the traffic noises and public transit annoyances used to wear on my nerves. (I’m very lucky in being able to ride out COVID: homeowner, my own home office, able to work remotely, no kids, so-so AC, plenty of green space in the backyard.) I’m also reasonably happy keeping in touch with friends online. (I have dear friends I’ve never met, including the other three members of Turtleduck Press.) But I haven’t been doing a good job of *actually* keeping in touch. All the suffering right now is very hard to bear, plus I miss contra dance (and contra hugs) a lot…so I’ve kind of withdrawn from peopling. Still having trouble finding words, too. I…

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Week Seven

We’re into Week Seven of pandemic life here in Toronto. More than that if you count the weeks of constant hand sanitizing, before schools closed and most workplaces were declared non-essential. I’m counting from when my workplace told us to start working from home full-time, and I started living my best life as a hermit. Okay, I’m kidding about that last part. The stress is taking its toll. My will-power and short-term memory are shot. Keeping the kitchen stocked with groceries is taking way too many brain cycles. I’m turning inward – I keep needing naps at odd times, I don’t want to talk to people (except my spouse, he’s allowed…), and going outside for walks is too much effort (though to be fair, we’ve had a cold and miserable spring). Yet I have no desire to watch TV, and I’m having trouble concentrating on books (!). And no, I am definitely not spending this time learning new skills or reorganizing my house. I live with many of these symptoms from depression, but I don’t think I’m depressed now. I think it’s just freakin’ hard to live through a world-altering era of massive uncertainty. (And that’s even with all the privilege I have: I’m not an essential worker, I haven’t been laid off, my workplace is set up to allow us to work from home (just in the last few years…how timely is that?!), I don’t have kids, my home is big enough that my spouse and I and his…

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Life in the Time of Pandemics

One month ago, I was in here writing about imperfect friendships. Then the world entered a time warp called COVID-19, and ten years later, here I am again. What a surreal month it’s been, and from all accounts, things are going to get less like reality before they settle down into…well, whatever our new normal is, anyway. Last month, I was gloating about having had four weekends of contra dance in a row. I didn’t know then that our Leap Day dance would be our last for the foreseeable future, or that I would soon be really glad I decided to attend that dance weekend in February again. (For one thing, I bought a twirly skirt that weekend and wore it to one dance before everything ended. It’s the only contra dance skirt I can stand to wear right now. It cheers me up because it’s teal with purple patterns and swishes beautifully when I walk, but it’s not loaded with memories like my other skirts.) Four weeks ago, the dance organizing committee I’m on was debating whether it would be smart to cancel our March 14 dance. We could see what was coming, but hoped we could squeeze in one last event. But I’m glad we didn’t know we were saying goodbye on February 29…it would have been too sad. Three and a half weeks ago, all the schools here in Ontario closed, and we knew we had no choice but to cancel the entire rest of the dance…

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