The New Normal Amidst COVID-19: Get Me Off This Emotional Rollercoaster (Part 2)
Wednesday, March 18th
via Insider
What next? I thought, as I sat in my car, as tears slid quietly down my face. Having just dropped off dinner for my boyfriend at his house, leaving it in a paper bag outside his bedroom door, I wandered in a daze back out to my car, got inside. I turned the ignition but didn’t leave...I couldn’t see past the blur. So instead, I buried my face in my hands and sobbed, feeling overwhelmed, and helpless.
What next? I thought, as I sat in my car, as tears slid quietly down my face. Having just dropped off dinner for my boyfriend at his house, leaving it in a paper bag outside his bedroom door, I wandered in a daze back out to my car, got inside. I turned the ignition but didn’t leave...I couldn’t see past the blur. So instead, I buried my face in my hands and sobbed, feeling overwhelmed, and helpless.
An hour earlier I had finished cooking dinner for Jake, wrapped it up, and was taking it to his house. He had entered a strict self-quarantine. Following a two-week trip to Thailand, Jake came back stateside and got tested the next day for the coronavirus, with instructions from his doctor to go home and isolate as though he had it until he heard back. So he did.
via Yahoo Life
So I would bring him dinners, bake cookies for his house (“I haven’t talked to a girl in a really long time…” said one roommate wistfully). Take care of him. Because an extrovert who can’t leave his room “until further notice” is a recipe for a severe case of cabin fever. At first we chuckled at this funny new way of interacting. I hadn’t seen him for two weeks, and our interactions were still stunted to six feet apart, on opposite ends of his hallway, him wearing a mask, me with a bottle of Purell back in my car as soon as I got back inside. Our “date nights” had shrivelled to a sad state: me waving hello to him from my car, him reciprocating from his second-floor bedroom window. It was so pathetically sad that we would laugh.
But that first night of quarantine, we didn’t laugh. That first night I brought him dinner and snacks in that paper bag, I showed up and plunked down on the couch to chat with his housemates. Are you still working? At home or in the office? How weird is all this…Then my phone buzzed. It was Jake. I answered the phone giggling at his roomies’ silly cracks on how desperate they were for physical touch when I heard something different in his voice. I started upstairs and heard him say “Don’t come in, don’t come in…” So I ducked into another rooommate’s bedroom next to his, and heard next: “My mom just called...my grandfather passed away today.”
Mere hours after he’d just been ordered to stay in his room. Hours. And even now, he couldn’t leave his room. (He had, after all, seven other housemates, who’d all be put at risk if he turned out to test positive).
via Banks & Jones
My hand flew to cover my mouth. Just like that. His granddad had been so kind to me, so close to Jake. And he was gone. Would he go to the funeral? Would there be one? When could he leave town? Or his room?
I tried to stay calm. I let him process and speculate, which is all we were left with. Could he go home? Not until he tested negative. If so, he’d go straight home and help his mom with affairs. If he tested positive, best case scenario was getting to go home two weeks later. Too late.
His voice shook. My heart broke.
I came back downstairs and, sensing something was up from my face and my voice, his roommates had stepped outside to greet visitors and stall them on the front porch (at that point, we’d only been mildly discouraged from having them).
My hand flew to cover my mouth. Just like that. His granddad had been so kind to me, so close to Jake. And he was gone. Would he go to the funeral? Would there be one? When could he leave town? Or his room?
I tried to stay calm. I let him process and speculate, which is all we were left with. Could he go home? Not until he tested negative. If so, he’d go straight home and help his mom with affairs. If he tested positive, best case scenario was getting to go home two weeks later. Too late.
His voice shook. My heart broke.
I came back downstairs and, sensing something was up from my face and my voice, his roommates had stepped outside to greet visitors and stall them on the front porch (at that point, we’d only been mildly discouraged from having them).
The very empty streets of Washington D.C. via Patch
Cue me, stepping outside to my car, ready to burst as soon as I slammed the door shut.
Until then, the world was weird. Everything was all so weird. To have strangers dart off the sidewalk to avoid me as I passed them on my jog. To transition to teleconferences when our usual meetings were in person, where I could hear and see my coworkers laugh and tease each other. The way coffee shop baristas seemed to say no to every other thing I asked...can I use cash? Can I reuse my cup? Can I use a laptop here? And to hear the federal government, no less, discourage handshakes, hugs, and close contact.
But now? What next? To watch someone strong and self-assured, who I care deeply about break, hearing him crack in turn cracked me.
So there I sat, suddenly hating everything that was happening, and sobbing from this helpless feeling I also hated. I hated being flinched away from each time I forgot. I’d forget to adjust the way I went about my day, because I’d never had to go about my day as though I were leprous. Suddenly I had to re-define being caring toward others by keeping my distance from them. I used to feel guilty for keeping my distance from people on purpose, in case selfish motives were at the root of it. Now news headlines, politicians, CDC leadership were telling me that’s exactly what I was supposed to do. I hated walking outside my house and feeling as if I were a character in I Am Legend, given how barren the streets were in my formerly bustling city...even on a pretty, sunny day, and not knowing what price I’d pay for it. I hated all the caution, the quiet, the echoey confines of my little row house, feeling anxious whenever I came into work or the grocery store, not knowing how careful to be, or what wasn’t careful enough.
I had no idea what to do.
I came home and trudged upstairs to my bedroom, wincing at my cramps. Nothing, not even a global pandemic, would halt my uterus’ monthly rebellion in my abdomen…
I reached for a bottle of Ibuprofen, then stopped, remembering that Jake had mentioned a doctor’s excerpt he’d read detailing that a recent study indicated that Ibuprofen may be linked to increased risk of coronavirus. Uuuuuuuuugh. I fell into bed and reasoned I’d still be able to fall asleep in between cramps. Eventually, I did.
That Weekend
A week into the first wave of major shifts, I started making strides in shifting my mindset. Instead of taking offense when people flinched away (or in one woman’s case when I was out for an absent-minded jog, lept away), I realized the intense fear and anxiety that many people now dealt with every day. Activities and choices - like leaving the house, running errands, and choosing who I spent my time with - now carried a new weight. Caring for those around me now meant something it never meant before in my lifetime: staying away from them. Avoiding cash. Speed-walking around the corner to sneeze. Timing my morning jogs during low-level pedestrian traffic.
On the thought of trust: did I trust those I normally wouldn’t think twice about hanging out with to take the same measures? A disturbing thought came to mind, albeit an important one to shift perspective: what if we started treating those with whom we shared air the same as those we’ve slept with? Can you imagine the seismic shift? In school they taught you the rapid spread of STI’s, and to be realistic and aware, you had to regard each sexual encounter with a partner as though you’ve also shared sexual encounters with everyone they’ve also had sex with.
via Slate
What if we thought this way about spreading germs? It blew my mind to have to think of every seemingly “harmless” moment when I came in contact with no none, but I for sure entered their six-foot radius, or them into mine. How many times have I done that in the stretch of a painfully boring weekend? And with how many people? Ten? Twenty? Fifty? I’d never had to count it before.
Rapidly, my perspective shifted yet again, in new waves, every day. One week’s time proved to enact more change than anyone ever thought possible.
What have you learned in your growing measures of social distancing?
What if we thought this way about spreading germs? It blew my mind to have to think of every seemingly “harmless” moment when I came in contact with no none, but I for sure entered their six-foot radius, or them into mine. How many times have I done that in the stretch of a painfully boring weekend? And with how many people? Ten? Twenty? Fifty? I’d never had to count it before.
Rapidly, my perspective shifted yet again, in new waves, every day. One week’s time proved to enact more change than anyone ever thought possible.
What have you learned in your growing measures of social distancing?
Thumbnail image via Sky News
