This has been my problem, I think: the lack of any exterior pressure or consequence that demands I stop work. I’m left to make that judgment on my own, and that part of me that always wants to do more is never going to say “You’ve done enough, it’s ok to stop.”
Just doing the math now, and it’s been… 130 days. A bit over four months, that we’ve isolated at home and stopped hugging the people who don’t live under the same roof. It’s difficult to compare the description of time (four months) with the feeling of time. Because it feels like it’s been so much longer.
Going down a path in the Nichols Park Wildflower Meadow.
Over the past month, the number of confirmed cases there [Arizona] has grown nearly fourfold; the number of people hospitalized has more than doubled. On Tuesday, the state reported more than 3,500 new cases in one day. That’s equal to 494 new cases for every 1 million residents, a figure that rivals New York State’s numbers in March and April.
In my one-on-one with my boss Ryan, I had an interesting revelation. We talked a bit about working more hours, and how people seem to be logging in more time with work (now that everyone is working from home). I mentioned having a hard time pulling away, and having a propensity to work longer days. And as we discussed this,…
“That’s a terrible number. I mean, 1,000 deaths a day from this? 20,000 new infections a day? I mean, that’s not an epidemic you have under control. You know, we don’t talk about it that way, but that’s a rapidly spreading epidemic. Now, we may become complacent about that, we may sort of accept that as the new norm. And that may lull us into a sense of complacency when fall arrives. And that’s a worry.”
Our walks have someone gone along the same routes, though we’re trying to vary things up a bit. I used to really prefer the same routes, back when we were running on a semi-regular basis. But for walks? I’m not so OCD that I want the same path every day.
I’ve largely stopped reading about Coronavirus. There was a while there where I was consuming any article I could fine, trying to gauge how the US was doing, how Chicago was doing, how the cities where my family lived were doing. It all got to be a bit much, and for my own sake… I just had to stop. It’s…
There were more folks out and about today, which was nice – but the park wasn’t overly crowded. People kept their distance, and there seemed to be the standard mix of those with and without masks (most folks who were moving had masks on, and most who were settled in place did not).
Despite it being all video and a little laggy… it still felt nice to once again hang out. Something we really haven’t done in a long while. We got to talking and joking towards the end, and it felt a bit more “normal.” Or as normal can feel, done entirely via video.
I’m not sure when it happened, but I was overcome again with a feeling of dread and despair. I haven’t felt like this since the first 2-3 weeks of the Coronavirus, and much if my emotions kicked up again.
What I can’t tell: whether my brain is being pragmatic or paranoid. Is this eight day rule something that can keep us safe? Or is the eight day rule something I’m willing to adopt/accept, despite the risks, because I’m getting tired of being in quarantine?
I’ve forgotten how fantastic it is, to lend ones voice to a choir – to become a part of some larger energy greater than any single, individual part. It’s rare for me to sing much anymore, but this was a lovely reminder of what can happen when we all gather together.
It’s both good and bad, I think, that I take work very personally. At times, I tend to let work define me as a person. And if I am not doing well at work, it feels that I, as a person, am not doing well.
It’s harder to find meaningful things to post each day, when most days follow the same sequence (computer, TV, sleep). But maybe it’s even more essential to keep this up, to find those things that make one day different from the one before. I had that philosophy regarding the blog, once upon a time a long while ago… and perhaps it’s not being put more fully to the test.