Home Posts tagged "pandemic" (Page 2)

Tag: pandemic

COVID Christmas, Year 2

Things are a bit different than they were last year. For one, we’ve gotten vaccines and boosters, whereas last year we did not. We’d had a full lockdown in March, and this year, we didn’t. Masks are not required now in Michigan but are “recommended.” And yet, COVID-19, the “virus in Seattle” from December 2019, is still very much with us. We’re on our, what, twelth variant now (second Variant of Concern) with omicron? There was a tweet the other day from a doctor about not wanting to learn the entire Greek alphabet due to the virus. I don’t mind that. I find it kind of interesting; kind of like the tropical storm/hurricane naming. I just want it gone. Last year, my family made the heartbreaking decision to not see my in-laws for the holidays. They’re elderly, and we were concerned about them catching the virus. We did a FaceTime thing on Christmas Day to open gifts and that was okay…and we made the best of it….but let’s be real. It just wasn’t the same. They were missed. Terribly. This year, we’re all vaccinated and boostered, so we’re going for it. We’re seeing them both days, actually. It is great to go back to some measure of normalcy, although the specter of this thing is still hanging in the background, always there. Siri Paulson, my fellow Turtleducker, posted on Facebook a meme about in the future, how we’ll be going through old stuff and run across a mask and it’ll…

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Re-entry, Part 2

You’ve got me for a second time this month because KD is busy putting the finishing touches on her awesome haunted-house ghost-chaser found-family novel, which will be out just in time for Halloween! (Are you excited? I’m excited.) [CW: pandemic, mental health] I blogged a couple of months ago about facing down the prospect of re-entry, and enough has shifted since then that I thought it would be worth revisiting… Since getting my second shot in June, I’ve seen friends a couple of times a month (not that far off from the frequency in my pre-COVID social life, except that pre-COVID there was dancing, which meant seeing a lot more friends each time). I’ve been to restaurants a few times, either on patios or in very well-ventilated spaces or with very few other patrons. I’ve stayed in a hotel. I even got to see (and hug!) a few family members I don’t live with. I’ve gone out to run errands more often. I’ve been to the mall once or twice. I’ve been to the dentist, the hairdresser, the optometrist. It’s gradually getting easier and less weird to be around people again. November, though, will be the big test. I’ve been working from home since March 13, 2020 — quite happily, aside from this whole pandemic thing. But my dayjob is calling people back into the high-rise office one day a week (which, for me, also involves a long public transit ride). I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t causing…

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This Time, I Will Breathe

It’s that time again, friends – the time when I come back from vacation vowing that Now Things Will Be Different. This time, in my day-to-day life I will get outside more and move my body more (like I did during vacation…we walked 8 km / 5 miles upriver one day, and went kayaking downriver the next day!) and get on top of all those niggling appointments that need to be made (the kicker is when you get them made and then they spawn MORE appointments). This time, I will make my house feel more like the hotel I just came back from – calming, nicely decorated and nicely lit, not stuffed with random crap – and take care of all (or at least some) of the little things that have been bugging me. Oh, and this time, I will make sure to relax more. Right. You can see the problem. The goal, of course, is to stop feeling like vacation is a precious breath of air before I go under again. I’m not drowning, exactly, but I am swimming very hard. My day job is the lake I’m trying to cross, with a shoreline that seems very far away and is always moving. The pandemic is a constant undertow that makes everything ten times harder (mentally/emotionally, that is; I’m lucky that my work isn’t directly affected, except for having gone virtual). Bad news (pandemic-related or otherwise) is the slap of a wave in the face. Weekends are when I…

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The Anti-Blog Post

It’s finally happened, friends. It’s been so long since I’ve written any fiction, or even poetry, that I’ve also forgotten how to blog. Not that there’s nothing in my brain. Oh no, it’s full of all sorts of things — my ever-growing to-do list at the day job, whether my broken sandal can be fixed, when it will feel safe to fly cross-country to visit my family again, how to rescue my tomato plants from the various ailments they’re suffering from this year, the various comfort viewing and comfort reading I’m doing, whether my bathroom ceiling fan is on the verge of breaking down or just needs a good cleaning, various appointments I’m putting off making because they’re not urgent, just how perfect the weather has to be before I’ll go for a long walk, whether any of my fall/winter clothes still fit and how much I should buy to replace them if my size is still changing, what we should name KD’s upcoming spooky book. The problem is that there’s no narrative. No cohesive whole. Just a set of ping-pong balls ricocheting around and failing to get into phase. Maybe it’s because of the elephant in the room that we’re all trying not to think about too hard: nothing will ever be quite the same as it was before, but when will normal things feel safe again? Will they ever? Maybe it’s because existential anxiety on top of everyday busyness is not conducive to creativity, even though we’re all…

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Achievement Unlocked

My first job in Arizona was at a day-care center. For years afterwards (and still sometimes, for reasons) I would tell people, “I can handle eight one-year-olds for eight hours alone. I can do anything.” Yes, it was a constant round of diaper checks (every child had to be checked every hour, and changed if needed which they usually did need) but I kept eight one-year-olds happy and healthy for eight hours a day and that is a confidence builder right there. When I worked at Taco Bell, my brag was that I could make a six-pack of tacos, from taking the first shell to closing the box, in twenty-six seconds. And it would be right. Some people over-packed the meat, or under-packed the cheese, but my tacos would be exactly the way the company wanted them made. And I’d do it in twenty-six seconds despite the fact that I couldn’t get all six shells in one hand like some of the “steamers” I worked with. Two was the best I could do, and still move fast. Outside of Taco Bell, that’s not really a very useful brag, though. I stuck with the “eight one-year-olds” bit in other places. Then my dear friend moved from Ohio to Arizona, and I drove her truck. “I drove a seventeen-foot truck from Ohio to Arizona by way of shudder Oklahoma,” I would say. “I can handle this!” For whatever value “this” was. By the way, that’s a seventeen-foot bed. The truck is twenty-three…

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Bringing the Fun Back

So I was scrolling through my Facebook feed and stumbled across this: Sweet-Ass Affirmations 2 / A Card Deck for Creative Maniacs . Of course I was intrigued. I followed the link, and discovered something truly awesome. It’s an affirmation deck, which is cool. Now I don’t currently own any, nor have I really delved into them before, but hey, there’s a first time for everything. But what got my muse all a-flutter was the idea of fun and play and creative and mania and bringing out the joy in life – because, c’mon now, we all need that, but for me, I’ve been thinking about this VERY THING. It’s like the Universe is giving me a gentle nudge. Synchronicity. Because I was just thinking that I needed to make my writing fun again. I’ve been struggling for weeks on my novella. I’m in the process of loosely plotting it, building a bit of a roadmap to follow, as is my process, and I’ve found myself horribly stuck. The idea was exciting and interesting and fun months ago when I thought of it. Now? It just feels like work. It could be that everything these days feels like work. Work’s been crazy, my sleep is still not right, I haven’t been feeling good about anything, the pandemic has been getting me down (we’re still not out of the woods, but that’s another post), and I just feel very….hopeless? Pointless? Crappy? Right now. I can’t even put my finger on it,…

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Re-entry

[CW: COVID, mental health, depression, anxiety] Last spring, we watched COVID coming. First it was very far away, until suddenly it wasn’t anymore. First handwashing was enough, then it wasn’t and everyone was sent home (for certain values of “everyone”). Then it was a waiting game to see how bad the news would get here. Back then, I just…froze. (I’m a natural worrier anyway. I have a history of depression; I haven’t been diagnosed with anxiety, but I wouldn’t be surprised either.) My brain heard “pandemic” and went into hindbrain survival mode. Never mind that I’m not a health care worker, nor a front line worker, nor a hospitality worker watching my job or business evaporate. Never mind that I didn’t have any loved ones in long-term care. (I do have loved ones who are vulnerable for other reasons, though.) Never mind that I didn’t know anyone who died of it (until this year, but that’s another story). I’ll be honest: I spent more than a month barely functioning. Eventually I called my doctor and we tweaked some stuff and then I could function again, but it still wasn’t pretty. I turned into a workaholic instead (partly because my job got super busy right at the same time). I did manage to stay connected with friends online–multiple ongoing text chats, Zoom watch parties, Zoom yoga. Sometimes I didn’t feel like talking, but they understood. My mental health has been improving, mostly. But physically I became a hermit (to be fair,…

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Timelines

by Siri Paulson I am increasingly convinced that we are living in the wrong timeline the one the time traveler is supposed to come back and fix she was supposed to win he was meant to live we should have learned our lesson from the pandemic that almost was from that time we all messed up, or the other time, or the other one but she has taken a wrong turn in the multiverse he is fighting the pterodactyls stuck in the far future with the giant crabs intubated in some locked-down ward the portal dark and idle the time machine hidden and locked up tight waiting for the one with the knowledge who will never come to release it from its long and lonely wait or maybe they know not to come here maybe these are the years they always skip in their tours through the past maybe this is how things have to be if we want the shiny future we were promised long ago maybe we’re waiting for a rescue that will never come there’s no-one but us to mend the timeline to put things right one butterfly at a time we are all time travelers one second per second, one way only one day we’ll live in the future how it looks is up to us

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Time to Rest

I’m sure I speak for many of us when I say I’m tired. It’s been a long and extremely stressful winter; for some of us, it’s been traumatic. Social media is showing me memories from this time last year, when there was an outburst of online creativity and caring and memes. We poured our fear and anxious energy into action. We didn’t realize then just how long a marathon we were in for, did we? This weekend, I had four days off work in a row, for the first time since Christmas. (I’m Canadian, so we get Good Friday off, and some sectors also get the following Monday.) I was prepared to crash for two days. Which I did, and thoroughly enjoyed it. On Friday and Saturday, I lounged around in bed, finished a book (reading, not writing, alas), went for some walks, ordered pizza, and that was pretty much it. I was not prepared to crash for three days. But that happened anyway. On Sunday, my big accomplishment was dragging my own butt and my husband’s out to the backyard with a picnic blanket so we could enjoy the beautiful weather. On the fourth day, Monday, I ran around like a madwoman (I have a mental disorder, I can say that) to try and accomplish at least some of the things I’d hoped to catch up on…like housework and dealing with all the vegetables we had just optimistically had delivered Somehow it took me all afternoon to make carrot…

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The Breath-Stealer

by Siri Paulson In a dark pandemic winter our breath is trapped in our lungs with fear of the breath-stealer “Look for the helpers” sounds stale by now “Let’s talk” sounds laughable “Thank you” will never be enough we cling to “Protect the vulnerable” but it’s a long, long road each of us walking alone or in tiny groups, bereft of the touches and smiles and tiny moments that made up our lives, once A day in the neighbourhood, going for brunch with a loved one, chatting with shopkeepers, strolling home along the sidewalk our breath easy, relaxed… A spin on the dance floor, a community moving together, stomping and twirling as one, smiling into others’ faces, breathing each other’s air as the band plays on the stage… A hug from a loved one, family or a dear friend, catching a wink or a gaze, sharing a plate across the table, a visit to a home where we are welcome, a head massage or a playful poke, breathless because we’re laughing so hard, casual platonic intimacy… A flight across the globe, an adventure away from home, new air entering our bodies as we breathe deep new smells sounds tastes sights, to carry back inside us, expanded… We never dreamed of a day when we’d lose all of those at once the little things and the big ones, crowds and theatres and stadiums casual shopping, casual hugs, bare faces and free breaths, lives more expansive than we knew… Now we are…

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