Where Did They Go?

 From time to time during these last two pandemic years I have written pieces about how this COVID business was unfolding. It was a way for me to acknowledge the impact of COVID in the big world as well as in my own tiny world. In the beginning Fear was the dominant player.  When authorities ordered everything, including parks and beaches, to close, Anger walked right alongside Fear. Once the parks and beaches were open again, Anger took a nap and let Resignation walk along with Fear.  Sadness and Grief also came into the game because there were so many people and experiences being lost. Even hugs and birthday parties were put on time out.  There wasn’t much anyone could do but wait for a vaccine to become available.

Once the vaccine became available, Hope joined the game and dominated the play. But not for long. Since some people refuse to believe in science, the vaccine could not really fully accomplish the task of making the world safe again. Anger got to come back into the game. Hope was still on the field but playing with an ice pack and Advil. And that’s about where we are right now.

The way I see it, many people are done with COVID. They say it’s time to get “back to normal”.  Get vaccinated or not but live with the consequences. I can see that we are headed there but, for me, we are not there yet. There are too many fragile populations that cannot be vaccinated (children under age 6, for example) and too many immunocompromised people or very elderly people to just act as if COVID is done. I’m in the group that says, “Wait. I can keep wearing a mask in public indoor spaces. I can avoid any indoor gatherings unless all are vaccinated. I can hold off on travel to certain areas where COVID numbers are high. I can continue social distancing when I am in public places. I can do this for now. I can do this until science says otherwise.”

It’s not the end of the game but things are starting to wrap up. COVID, in the end, is likely going to lose this game. The season isn’t over though and it won’t be over until human beings figure out how to live forever. (Side note: Why would you want to live forever? But I digress.) The game is still in play.

At this point in the game, I am noticing the effects that COVID has had on the world and on me. If you want to know economic, sociological, medical, or global effects, I‘ll simply direct you to any media outlet. There’s a lot of information out there. 

Now that we are coming through this and I can see it through a longer lens, I am somewhat surprised at the impacts I notice on myself. In the beginning,  I didn’t object to enforced isolation as long as I could get outside to hike, bicycle, and walk at the beach. I did find myself missing the casual hugs from family and close friends. It was weird to see my own offspring from six feet away and not leave them without a hug. I missed the family gatherings.  When newborns came along, I was sad to have to hold them with the intrusion of a mask. The longer COVID goes on, the more withdrawn or remote I seem to be. I wonder if that’s the same for other people? 

The biggest surprise for me personally is the loneliness that I am experiencing. I am embarrassed to write that because it seems so fragile and shaky but I think it’s true. Only very recently that I have come to realize that I feel claustrophobic in this safety bubble. Beyond a once a week grocery store trip,  regular stops at the library to pick up books, and a rare dentist or doctor visit, I don’t see people in person very often. I don’t go out on the old school errands, I don’t go out for meals, I don’t get together with the friends I used to have,  I do provide child care for two babies and I do see their parents for pick up and drop off but seldom do we socialize beyond the childcare details. I have started to see my extended family a bit more, driving to their homes for a rare visit (all of these people have been vaccinated).  I live with somebody so there is another person here in the house but that is a 24/7 situation and can be draining in its own way. 

I wonder about the friendships that I referenced above? I wonder what happened to them? I had intelligent, funny, creative friends and we used to have some fun evenings and/or walks. Everyone seems to be gone now. At the beginning of the pandemic, we stayed in touch via text but after a few months, the texts became less and less frequent until they pretty much disappeared. It’s puzzling to me. Have I changed? Have they changed? Is everyone bored? Did they find a different world that no longer includes me? Is everyone so overwhelmed with COVID + global warming + political/social unrest that there is no room for personal interactions?  I have reached out here and there yet the response has been lukewarm. I wonder if other people are finding this to be true. 

To balance the loss of in person friendships, however, I have developed a broad range of internet friendships. I didn’t do this on purpose. Prior to the pandemic, I had a pleasant on line community, primarily through Twitter. I had regular connections with other people who enjoyed books, art, music, poetry, travel, photography, flowers, and beauty of all kinds.  There were also political and social justice discussions in which I was able to participate and that gave me interesting  connections.  But when the outside world shut down in 2020, I found myself connecting even more with people from all around the world. It has been fascinating and exciting to me. If I can’t travel or engage with people in the real world, I can at least have some conversational fun in the 280 character tweet world. I love interacting about books, about art, about poetry, about the view out the window. I get a kick out of posting words, photos, ideas and seeing what comes back to me. This stuff makes my solitary world more expansive and interesting. 

*Originally published on my Wordpress blog 03.25.2022

There are a few people with whom I have developed deeper electronic friendships by engaging in longer than tweet conversations via direct messaging. Those can be especially rich exchanges but, nonetheless, these connections are not “in real life” friendships. Yes, they offer companionship of a sort but it’s limited. This companionship is printed words on a screen, offering bits and pieces of hearts and minds. It engages touch (via typing!) and vision. One can’t hear the other, nor smell, nor feel their physical presence in the room. It’s as if you get only a fraction of the other. And words on a screen? So much can be misread, misinterpreted via words on a screen. And it takes time and effort to type all those words which can also get lost in the flow of more words.  Does emotion always find its way through cyberspace? In short, although I value internet connections, they simply cannot take the place of in real life relationships.

So I am left waiting for life to “be normal” again. I am wondering if and when connections with real people will resume. Will I ever see those old friends again in the same way as before?  Here’s a good example of what I mean. Pre pandemic, I was a regular participant in twice weekly yoga classes and in weekly art classes. The yoga studio closed down for good about two months ago so those classes will never resume again. I had friends in those classes but now? Now I will likely never see most of them again. I had friends in the art classes conducted at the local art center. The center still has some of their classes on line now but I want the real deal. I need in person art classes and I miss my friends from those classes. 

A lot of my friends are people that I have known for years and years. They are people with whom I worked or whose children played with my children when they were little. How is it that a global pandemic made people go silent? And what will make them come out again? Have lives changed that much in these two years? I know several friends who have suffered the loss of loved ones. Living situations have changed for others with children and/or spouses moving in or out.  Among friends, some have changed jobs or retired. A couple of friends have physically moved away (without a chance to hug goodbye) .  All of these changes and yet no opportunities to process them makes for shaky friendships.  I wonder if the answer is going to be building new friendships?  How is that going to happen as long as we are still living in a COVID influenced world? I don’t know. I don’t know. I can’t see into the future and, at this point, I don’t even want to. It feels scary and isolated. But maybe I will be surprised?  I hope so.