I am the poster child for social distancing. I can just take so much peopling and then I have to retreat to my home for however long it takes me to rejuvenate. Sometimes, it can take a while. But three months of isolation has taken its toll on me. Everything hurts on me because I don't exercise. Walking my dog makes my back ache. Deep cleaning the bathroom requires a nap. My eating habits are atrocious. I began this experience with the intention of cooking lean, healthy meals. Somehow I got hooked on cheezies and peppermint patties; the hell with veggies and protein. The eleven pounds I recently lost were back when I last checked. Yard work? Every time I gathered the energy, it poured. So, no trimmed evergreens for me. My play was canceled before the first rehearsal. The trip to NYC was canceled when Broadway went dark. And so on. And so on. And so on.
Depressed? Yes, safe to say I am. I'm not alone. The seniors of the Class of 2020 lost out on the "senior year experience." My dog groomer's business folded during the pandemically forced closure. The people coming to my church's food pantry are really suffering. Many new clients join us every Friday lamenting the loss of jobs, the inability to pay bills, and facing the embarrassment of needing help. Some of our clients have suffered drastically because their AA and NA meetings aren't happening. Many of our regulars are MIA and we worry about them. Some of our clients are taking out their anger and frustration on us. They fight us about wearing masks. They complain about waiting in line six feet away from the nearest neighbor. One even called me a motherf--, well, you get the idea. It's been tough. People have lost loved ones and were unable to hold or attend funerals. I have a friend whose sister is hospitalized for dementia, and J. believes she may never see her sister again. Teachers and students were thrust into a world of on-line schooling that no one planned or trained for. In many situations, the stress of schooling exacerbated tensions already existing between parents, teachers, and students. The world is a mess. Bodies pile up in refrigerated trucks. ICUs are full to capacity. There aren't enough ventilators or even protective gloves and masks to properly equip our tireless medical personnel. Our president jokes about injecting bleach to curtail the virus. He advocates taking a drug that has not been proven to help, but in which he has a financial interest. He threatens to cut supplies to governors who don't kiss his ass. Leadership? What leadership have we had during this pandemic? Listening to the president's "news briefs" has been unnerving for most of the world.
Optimists like to say that this emergency has brought out the best in us. I guess I'm not an optimist.
The news is full of violence. Angry groups of people scream and threaten (with weapons brought into government buildings ) the lives of governors failing to reopen America quickly enough for them. A black man is murdered by a policeman kneeling on his neck, and that action leads to rioting. Farmers dump milk they can't sell, putting their futures in jeopardy. People spit on fruits and vegetables causing grocery stores to destroy produce. Citizens show their distain for those of us wearing masks by spitting and coughing on the mask wearers. They claim the government has no "right" to require its citizens to wear masks. Really? Any society, even an American society, has rules and regulations established supposedly for the good of the citizens. Your rights are being denied? Maybe you need to take another look at the rights you're so sure you're entitled to have. Even the things that started out well have soured. A Facebook group of wine fairies secretly gifted each other with bottles of wine mysteriously left on porches. That went south fast with bottles being stolen from porches and people whining (pun intended) that nobody fairied them. Or posted pictures to thank them for the good deed. The automobile parades past birthday peoples' houses have dwindled and folks are even complaining they can't get enough interest in their parade, or why won't someone do a parade for them??? The happy, optimistic this-is-what-we-did-today Facebook posts have stopped as people seem to have run out of happy optimism. I am weary. I'm told I don't pray enough; I don't trust God. Well, God gave mankind the "gift" of free will. He probably weeps as He watches how we use it.
No, I am not in hiding because I fear the Nazis taking my life. However, while I am self-isolating, I do fear for my life. The obvious fear? I am the exact target of this nasty virus that has killed over 100,000 Americans. And too many Americans have said that the extinction of the elderly, aka the weak, is an acceptable consequence for reopening the bars, the restaurants, the beaches, the parks. I constantly mourn the America we've become, and wonder if things will ever go back to the way they were. And then I'm stopped dead in my tracks. Will we ever go back to the way we were, or is this who we have been all along? Or, and this is a chilling thought, will things get worse?
Can Covid-19 bring out the best in us? Will it teach us lessons about what is really important? Will it leave us permanently changed, selfish, and/or vulnerable in a not-so-good way? Will it reveal who we are deep down when we think no one can see us? Will our world become "A Clockwork Orange?" Will we continue to hoard toilet paper?
I have run out of words. So, let me leave you with words from the expert in social isolation, Anne Frank.
