How are you?
Lately this question has become the norm to every virtual interaction for me since March 14th. My automated response had always been. "Good!" "Fine!" "Doing okay. How are you?" What was happening around me felt like a horrible movie where I just wanted to remain in the audience. It wasn't until this week that I finally came to terms with emotions I had felt guilty for feeling.
How could someone like myself complain? In a city that currently has 67,000 cases and 2,600 deaths, I'm alive and healthy as far as I know. I have a job, food, an apartment with an in-unit washer and dryer, a short walk to the park to continue to run, and access to friends and family through the tap of a phone. It should be easy for me to ride this out. Then this week hit me. Focus while working from home felt impossible in some moments. Soon it was habitual to look to meals and alcohol as the means to numb grief. Looking at a calendar is depressing with so much unknown. Instagram has almost become addictive in my insatiable need to not feel loneliness In this 500 square foot apartment I crave what brought me to New York City in the first place...plans and people.
At one point, I was running in my usual route in the park (isolated and 6 feet away) and saw a couple holding hands. It annoyed me and then I started to imagine when I would be able to do that. How would it feel to hug someone again? Panic and tears consumed me with these thoughts because there was and is no answer.
The phrase "At this time...." has been exhausted lately that I cringe just writing it. I want to remember what this world feels like because in my heart I believe that it's current state is not forever but is for now. I have been thrown for a new loop in my life and it compelled me to return to this blog. In 2011, I captured one of the most challenging times in my life. I'm fortunate that I can return to my writing to remind myself that I can and I will rise above pain.
