Catching Up: Things Are Changing!

For the last several weeks, my creative writing juices have been slowed to a trickle. I have been unable to come up with anything particularly compelling (even just to me) to write, as much as I have been wanting to contribute to this, my favorite blog of all time. The thing is, we have reached another moment of transition, and I've been processing. We started this project mid-pandemic, when it was unclear whether we had, in fact, even reached the midpoint. I shied away from optimism almost as a daily practice, in the name of preserving my own sanity. Now, with the prospect of good things returning to us, I've found myself confronting my expectations of what the future may entail. Honestly, I've found myself confronting the existence of a future. Right now, it feels like wary relief. 

Today, I am less than a week away from my second dose of vaccine. I have been actively making plans to see my friends. There are rumblings across my social circles of the best summer ever, a collective determination to make up for what has been lost this last year. In discussing apartment ideas with potential roommates yesterday, I advocated for a living room that was the antithesis of the work-from-home aesthetic. No more of that, please, thank you.

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But is recovery really as simple as just doing the opposite of whatever you were doing before? As much as I want to be done with constant internal reflection after this incredibly long year, I would fail myself if I didn't admit that this transition is already hard. There is no switch to flip. After being in my first group setting in a very long time yesterday, I was exhausted. And nervous! As much as I truly love my people, my threshold for human contact is still pretty minimal. I'm afraid of not being able to deliver when opportunities to socialize and make up for lost time start coming up more and more frequently. 

A couple days ago, I was feeling chaotic about the work I needed to get done, and found myself immensely frustrated with the lighting in my apartment. I'm on a lower floor, facing another building, so the sun has fairly limited access to my little row of windows. I had been outside with my dog earlier in the morning, and the weather had been glorious, and I was bothered at not being able to enjoy the nice day while I sat at my desk inside. I grumbled to myself (as one does), "why does it have to be so dark in here??" And then, looking up, I realized that it had started raining. So, I lit a candle, opened the window, and curled up on the couch to listen to the rain. It turns out, that was exactly what I needed, but I needed a cue from the outside world. And furthermore, what I needed was not at all what I had expected.

I guess all of this is a reminder to myself as much as it is a dispatch to others- try not to be attached to the outcome. I have spent so much time this year dreaming about what a post-pandemic life may look like, craving flashing dance floors and rooftop dinner parties and sleepy farmer's markets. More than anything, craving contact. But, as with most things, what you imagine is rarely what you get. Don't get me wrong, I think what's coming is going to be even better than what we could have imagined. I'm only reminding myself, it's okay if things don't look the way you expected them to. Just stay willing to see them.

-Helen