Well, it’s very private. I’ll say that. An intimate life with whomever you’re locked in with. Hopefully very peaceful, once you accept it.
And basically, i was personally already in a quarantine for 6 months last year and then very limited contact with people for the last several months. Just as my friend K, coming back from cancer – and so many other people in the world who are struggling with illness, or age, or means, or mental health or whatever. Chronic isolation was on board for us way before it became official.
I think it’s hard to be outside here in Doha this season anyway. If you are a bird, if you are a worker, if you’re a plant. The air is better inside. I was noticing that before i came over, the only way i had to access any information or understanding of this new country and city or our potential home was through research, on the computer screen. Now that i’m supposedly here physically, no part of that virtual-only experience has changed. Where am i? My survival – and comfort – is based solely on what i can learn and discover with my keyboard and phone – actual physical exploration is not available. So interesting. The experience remains virtual, although i have apparently arrived in a new physical locality.
And with time being revealed as a very odd construct, once you are removed from a natural world, one can float on whims in ways we could not do before. Get up and start laundry at 3am, no one knows – take to your bed for a couple of hours at 11am – have a cheeky cocktail at 3pm … who cares? Having a panic attack? No problem. No one sees you – so just do some art or yoga or dishes or whatever works for you on the spot. Brush your hair – or don’t. Our homes are consistently immaculate. What luxury!
And i’m finally writing for you all, rather than procrastinating. We are in a slow free-fall all together, so we have the opportunity to connect. It’s like getting the chance for that last phone call to your loved one as the plane is going down. Why wait?
“We have adjusted. It could be a lazy Sunday morning for us right now,” my friend B. reports.
But I do seem to have trauma rhythms. My M. describes the darker times “as the curtains being drawn” for a while. In the beginning of Covid life, i would have one decent day, followed by a very down day, where i just could not pull it together – over and over. Grief comes cycling through, on one of those old-fashioned, high-wheeled penny-farthing bicycles, wearing a clown nose and smiling broadly. Accepting a new reality is so challenging for all of us. Still, look how incredibly adaptable we are.
I’m becoming a hostess again- one of the key roles of my life which i haven’t been up to the past year of my personal internment, a loss which had measurably compromised my sense of self. Now i get to dress up, prepare, and be quizmaster for the work team, virtually invite family into our home, or gather friends together on a friggin’ Zoom. And you can leave the party whenever you want with a click. How perfect.
You know how i loath goodbyes. 😘
A neighbor paints on his balcony on a covidly April evening