The Distance

Yep, I’m going there. I’ve been wanting to write about “The Pandemic” since, well, 2020. But at the time, I was just doing what I could to keep my head above water and wasn’t ready to wax poetic about something that was still messing with my life in so many ways. As time went by, things started calming down, and we all just wanted to stick our fingers in our ears and say LALALA it’s over! That sucked, but now we’re done, let’s move on. I don’t blame us. What a shit show. Especially for those of us who already struggle with anxiety on a daily basis. What if I get sick? What about my kid? Is it safe to go to Walmart? Are there cooties on my groceries? How the hell do I log into my kid’s online school??? I didn’t know what to do with myself and my brain was spiraling. I missed the little things and the big things that made up my regular life and routine. I missed having some sense of control. And I desperately missed hugs. I can still bring up those feelings. What about you? Or did you not hear anything I just said because your fingers are still in your ears? Here’s the thing: Not everything that came out of the pandemic was necessarily bad. Seriously. Hear me out.

I’ve been cultivating a toolbox of self-care skills for many years, and I am pretty proud of the variety of tools I possess to manage my sometimes crushing anxiety. If you are a laid-back, Type B, go with the flow kind of person, this may sound a little dramatic. Let me see if I can explain. It’s not just that I worry. I mean, I do. A lot. Even if I don’t have anything particularly pressing going on, I can always find something to worry about. It’s the times that I’m not worrying, under stress, or even particularly have much on my mind but rainbows and butterflies then suddenly-BAM-I’m gripped by anxiety that borders on fear. For. No. Reason. At. All. I feel like I want to crawl out of my skin and I can’t pin it to anything tangible. Fortunately this doesn’t happen very often, and I haven’t had a full blown panic attack in like five years (did I just jinx myself?). But when a random sense of doom is a possibility, and drugs don’t work for you, you’ve got to have a toolbox.

Then we were told we had to sit still and not go anywhere, and I started to realize that a lot of my “self-care” was actually coming from outside of myself. I leaned on GTFO for survival. Get out of a rut, get out of my head, get out of the house. For example, after a few years of living that stay at home mom life I began to realize the importance of adult time. AKA without any children present. Just to talk, and maybe even have a complete, uninterrupted conversation. I made it my mission to get out of the house and spend kid-free time with friends a few times a month. Book club. Dinner. Paint and sip. Whatever. I just wanted a change of scenery and some connection. It was like a re-set I didn’t know I needed until I was driving home, feeling refreshed and relaxed. Then, The Pandemic said nope! Stay your ass at home. Pedicures, nope. Yoga class, nope. People, nope.

So, after a fair amount of freaking out, I had to make some adjustments. I rearranged my tool box and came up with some quick self-care go-to’s for when I started feeling overwhelmed. Mommy time-outs to breathe and start over, loud headphones full of music, hot baths, voracious reading, and walking around the block to stare at the trees…they became my best friends. I hate doing my own toes, but I got one of those foot spa thingies and my six year old and I set up our own damn nail shop. And yoga? I tried it online. A lovely friend of mine is a yoga teacher, and she was posting videos, which were great. But I missed the experience of in-person classes, and being a part of that community. The yoga mat has been my happy place since I was 15 years old, so I had to figure out how to do it on my own. Believe it or not, I went from practicing maybe once a week to #yogaeverydamnday. I started waking up every morning before anyone else, just so I could start the day with yoga and meditation. It’s not a marathon session, but it’s enough for me. It’s the best way I can think of to start the day in the right headspace. And I don’t have to go anywhere, or spend any money. Four years later, I’m still doing it. Did you start any new habits during that time which have stuck to this day? Besides daily drinking, I mean.

Another thing that meant the world to me was the depths of kindness that were reached during that dark time. The physical connection may have been severed, but we were still there for each other. From my beautiful neighbors that covered the sidewalks in our community with chalk art depicting messages of hope and humor, to the lovely family next door who dropped off a board game on our porch-which transformed long, dull nights into hilarious, marathon Sorry! playing sessions. I remember being so frustrated because I couldn’t find freaking toilet paper for my family, then my sweet friend dropped off a coveted, magnificent package of Charmin at my house. After a few weeks of sheltering in place, my daughter’s amazing first grade teacher stopped by for a socially distanced visit in the driveway to check in and catch up with her little student that adored her so much. We became creative. We missed each other. We reached out from a safe distance.

Here’s my question: Was there a point to all that fear, anxiety and soul-shattering separation? It felt like we were put in a global time-out, but did we learn our collective lesson? Maybe we were supposed to figure out that the distance we put between ourselves every day with all the electronics is damaging us. Instead of increasing our connection, social media has turned our fellow human beings into so many images on a tiny screen, to be dismissed or ridiculed or off-handedly “liked” with a thumbs up. As if they aren’t actually real people, just another form of entertainment. And yet, when we literally couldn’t be together, we fought it tooth and nail. Or maybe a duck is just a duck. An errant new virus was formed, as it does every hundred years or so, and it was just our turn to take the pain. Either way, I hope we mostly came out stronger on the other side. I know I learned a few things about myself, both good and bad. I’ve been changed by that experience. I’ve become more leery and private. But I’ve also gotten stronger. How about you?