April Isolation Leads to a May Staycation
It's April, and everything feels the same. Whoever thought Groundhog Day would actually be a collective experience? I start all my Facetime calls these days with "what a time!"
It's amazing how quickly one becomes nostalgic for the little things, that have very quickly become the big things. Sharing a meal with a friend at an expertly decorated restaurant. Sitting in a cafe sipping on coffee and writing amongst your community on a Saturday morning. Lifting weights with a bunch of strangers. Holding your new little niece as she fights a nap. The little things are everything. And you realize that at the end of the day, in the middle of the quarantine, you really do have everything you need. And that's something that not everyone can say.
My Apartment Cage/Cocoon
It took me a week to get out of a bit of a dark mental space. Being single and isolated is a bit of a lonely experience. Usually, I love coming home to an empty apartment, stripping down and changing into something comfortable and ugly, and diving onto my couch for some solace from the outside world, and, well, people quite honestly. I’m around people all of the time and being one of those very proud extroverted introverts, I need time alone to recharge. Like a little nightly battery plug-in to my charger of a couch.
But I never intended my apartment to become my isolation chamber. And it’s getting a little bit suffocating. I’m going to try and think of it more as a cocoon. A chance to retreat, reset and recharge over a longer period and come out the other side with my systems all good to go, my head on straight and maybe having thought long and hard about some of the things I want. Or at a minimum having fabulous hair from the ability to wash it every other day.
But I never intended my apartment to become my isolation chamber. And it’s getting a little bit suffocating. I’m going to try and think of it more as a cocoon. A chance to retreat, reset and recharge over a longer period and come out the other side with my systems all good to go, my head on straight and maybe having thought long and hard about some of the things I want. Or at a minimum having fabulous hair from the ability to wash it every other day.
Melted cheese has become my hugs
Music my salvation
Runs are my release
I've never felt so lucky to be able to move my body and go outside. Running has been the cure for a lot of the dark moments I've had. It feels safer to go out these days when it's raining. I've embraced it and try to head out for my runs when the sky is cloudy. There are just fewer people out and about, and it's easy to keep my distance. Looking up at the sky. Realizing there's a world and future outside of my apartment. I'm even starting to love the little moment when you realize you need to move away from someone, and you give them a little nod and smile to say "it's not you, it's the covid." It's probably more connection than I would normally have with people on a run. And then there's:
The tingling feeling when a light drizzle hits my face,
The canopy of trees full of grace,
The tweeting birds that continue living at a fearless pace.
It's been a strange, disorienting and also busy time. I've face-timed with friends I haven't spoken to for years. I've had more red wine than I've had in years (what is it about isolation that brings forward an urge for red wine?). I've reached out to two of my favourite writers and they've been generous and lovely with their responses (and provided some great advice which I'll share in a later post). I finally ordered Goodfood to try because I can't face the grocery store too often, and it's pretty awesome. I rearranged my living room because I couldn't stand the look of it and I had to figure out how to manage working in it full-time. I collected 5 bags to donate (don't worry I won't donate till this thing is long gone to stop the spread). I've taken an Instagram course, participated in an online dance party, online writing course, and had a social distance date. I've also read a book where I got to escape to Buenos Aires (man books are magical...and I was almost on my way there this time last year) and started a second.
And I've cried a bit. Maybe more than a bit. I appreciate it as a good release.
I had planned to move forward on a lot of goals during this downtime to keep myself busy, but my job has become busier than ever. As a result I've slowed on the agent pitching and I'm not even sure how to proceed with that. I already knew that travel memoirs weren't that "in demand" these days (serves me right for taking 8 years to write it), and I know publishing is taking a hit. With a two-year timeframe to get published after you sign an agent/publisher, and with my desire to get it out, I'm going to give it a couple more months before I start more seriously looking into self-publishing. You'll buy it, right? You might think though with our inability to travel, and with the Olympics being postponed, people might want to escape to Japan in their reading? Maybe I should just self-publish already.
Tips for the Darker Times
Here's what's been helping me through the darker nights (sharing in the hopes it will help you too):
Active perception shifts: Hey this is just all those nights I thought "I'd rather stay home" all strung together.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy: I get trapped in a lot of the classic psychological thinking traps. One example is "All or nothing" thinking. I assume that because today is like this, all days will be like this. Instead, I should be reminding myself that I will hang with my parents again, that I will kiss again, and that I will hop on a plane and explore a new land again. CBT helps with a lot of these thinking patterns. I won't describe this technique here but there are so many tools online for this. And a great book called Mind over Mood. It's all about identifying the hot thoughts that send you down a spiral to a negative mental space and challenging those thoughts.
Mindfulness meditation: There are so many great free meditations out there right now. Oprah has released her 21-day hope meditation for free and there are daily live Instagram meditations by so many yoga studios etc. Byron Katie also has some good exercises to get you out of your head. Really my main goal in terms of mindfulness is to focus on getting through one single moment at a time. Magically you will find that these moments string together into a chunk of time and you'll wonder where it went. This is one of the truest things in life.
Escape: From the news. My job is 100% Covid related right now. So the news is not even an option after work. I try to escape into my writing as it's all I really have time for right now.
Acceptance: Practising acceptance of what is and trying not to fight it. One of the writers I mentioned above posted a story from one of her friends who in essence said, just calm TF down, you got this. She had been in a hospital bed without going outside for something like a year, and she said as soon as you accept this as your current state of being, a lot of the anxiety goes away and you relax into it.
Exercise: Every day. It doesn't balance my wine intake right now, but I wouldn't trade it. So many free live Instagram videos right now as well. Fit factory fitness is doing a very fun one.
Connection: Try to see another person every day. Even if just to remind yourself that you're actually there.
And finally forgiveness of myself for not being totally okay. For not having totally figured out and fixed my life in these two weeks of "downtime."
I leave you with this. There was the Metric song that I and my choir pals loved back in the day, The Shade. Here are some of the lyrics:
I want it all, I want it all
A blade of grass, a grain of sand
The moonlit sea, to hold your hand
I want it all, I want it all
I remember us joking and saying "man Metric is easy to please. I mean surely you want more than just a blade of grass." But now it makes all the sense in the world.
How are you all doing? Sending lots of love from my little isolation pod to yours!
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