Greetings from my apartment. Tomorrow will begin week 5 of sheltering in place. By myself. I would never, ever have thought I could be alone for 4 weeks without going insane. What I “counted on” in life has either completely ended or radically changed. Between the news of the world, concerns for my family and community, and getting laid off, I’m processing A LOT! Falling back on my grief counseling experience, I am able to remind myself that it’s normal to feel exhausted and overwhelmed.
Here in no particular order are a list of things that seem to be “working” for me – as in they bring me comfort, help keep me sane, elicit gratitude and even joy. Some of them are contradictory, and some things that work today may not work tomorrow. I’m sharing these with you with the hope that they may help, or you might laugh and see yourself in these. And also, I’ve been home, alone for 4 weeks, and I’m tired of talking to myself.
What’s Working:
- Getting outside every day, taking a walk
- Not hating myself if I don’t get outside every day and take a walk
- Smelling spring flowers (jasmine, hyacinth, daffodils = aroma therapy)
- Finally hanging up the hummingbird feeder gift I got for Christmas
- Watching the hummingbirds drink from the feeder, live TV
- Looking for things to be grateful for right as I wake up, reciting them
- Going for long bike rides
- Praying for all the people suffering in the world
- Ton Glen breathing/meditation technique
- Getting into bed early (like 8pm)
- Zoom calls
- Limiting my Zoom calls
- FaceTime with my mom, staying in “close contact” with her
- Texting with my kids
- Checking in daily with a few friends
- Not beating myself up about my messy desk or laundry pile
- Laughing at COVID19 memes
- Hula hooping to dance music
- Yoga at home and with my Santa Cruz gang on Zoom
- Thank God for Zoom!
- Facebook! Seriously, so beautiful to be able to connect to humans virtually
- Instagram (see above)
- Reaching out to old friends (great college roommate zoom hangout the other day!)
- Dancing in the living room, shaking it
- Lighting Shabbat candles every Friday night
- Crying
- Virtual Seder (so sweet – next year Jerusalem!)
- Bollywood films on Amazon Prime and Netflix
- Amazon Prime and Netflix in general
- Watching short, light, shows due to zero attention span
- Not judging my TV choices
- Getting up in the morning and making my bed, so I don’t get back in it at 9am
- Establishing “order” by keeping the house clean, doing the dishes
- Cooking delicious and thoughtful meals for myself
- Freezing the leftovers
- Being kind when I am not able to maintain the “order” of the house
- Eating my greens!
- Taking Bach flower remedy “Star of Bethlehem” for grief and shock
- Reading stories on Zoom to preschoolers, seeing their faces every day, laughing
- Checking in on my neighbors (2 lovely women on either side of me, both in their 80’s)
- Finding out that PG&E reduced my energy bill to $8 this month
What’s Not Working:
- No attention span for all the offerings (free or paid) on FB and Zoom
- Really hard for me to meditate right now
- Can only read a few pages at a time of books (see short attention span)
- Long Zoom calls (short attention span again, overload)
- Pep talks on how this is a perfect time to become awesome
- Missing physical contact with people and animals (missing having a dog!)
- Missing human contact in general
- Wishing I could swim (all pools are closed)
- Grieving all the fun things I had planned that have been canceled. (I had A LOT of things I was looking forward to)
- Keeping fruits and veggies fresh (eating them before they go bad)
- Wondering where/when I will ever be able to buy T.P. again, WTH America?
- Not sleeping very well at night (lots of thoughts between 2 – 4am)
- Looking at the FB Group “View From My Window” and comparing my view to everyone else’s
Roxanna Kopp Smith 