I wrote this last night, but it seemed too dark to post here, so I posted it on my Wordpress blog, which gets little traffic. But then I thought why? This is my reality. Maybe you'd like to tell yours too. So here it is. I'll be posting more. I've got time now.
Strange days. Today I was finally struck by the thought that I really could be deciding what I'll do with my final days of life. And then I wanted to take a nap. None of us can predict what the final days of our lives will look like. A year and a half later I still think often about my mom's final days, after she suffered her last, terrible stroke and we, my sister and brother and I, had to make the decision to take her off life support and wait several days for her body to catch up with our intention. She didn't know she'd spend her final day playing solitaire on her Kindle while she watched daytime TV in her kitchen, maybe enjoying a visit from my niece or my sister for a few minutes as afternoon turned to evening, eating a packet of instant oatmeal or leftovers from Meals on Wheels for dinner, chatting on the phone with my little brother, and then watching more TV from her recliner. Maybe she went to her weekly coffee group at the library, just up the alley, with her neighbor, who was even older than she was. Maybe she talked with her friend from country school days and made plans to visit another friend, housebound now, the next day for lunch. She couldn't have known she would spend that day on the floor of her bedroom, unable to even push her help button, until my sister found her 9 hours later.
We don't know. And so I spend these days not knowing if they are my last days, but knowing for certain nothing is going to be the same from now on. I struggle to stay engaged with the books I'm reading, the movies I try to watch. They are stories from another life. I'm glued to Facebook, waiting for more bad news instead of doing all the things I wished I had time for two weeks ago. Two weeks ago when I had jobs to go to and Girl Scouts and basketball games and piano lessons and ... all the things that seemed necessary and important.
I don't know what's important any more. And the things that are still important seem even more out of control than they did before the Big V. I still have to deal with them, but under this new way of living, I'm not sure how to manage them or whether it will even matter a month from now.
For example, I'm embroiled in not one, but two, custody lawsuits, filed against me by my 8-year-old granddaughter Coraline's dad and his parents. I probably shouldn't write about that, but I will say it's been a cruel state of affairs, costly in every way imaginable, and it started because I tried to get health insurance for Coraline, who has been living with me for the past 4 1/2 years. I still have to deal with it, even though it has become moot at this point as we face weeks, possibly months, of distancing and quarantine. If these are my final days, I resent spending them on this unnecessary burden .... and she still does not have health insurance.
For example, a few weeks ago I found out I need dental surgery to remove 5 or 6 of my front teeth, roots and all. I suffered a bad accident with a brick hearth 20 years ago and the damage has continued to flourish unknown to me or my dentist. My teeth, which are really tiny points holding a rack of crowns, could fall out any time; I'm wearing a retainer to hold them in. My surgery has been postponed indefinitely. There are worse things than being without front teeth, and I told myself that even before the viral shit storm hit. That accident could easily have killed me then. But I've spent the past weeks worrying and preparing, counting pennies to pay the dentists and the lawyers.
For example, I found out my house was robbed the same day I found out about my teeth, and I can't write about that either. So I'll just say it was bad timing and the losses from the robbery go far deeper than the possessions I will never see again.
I'm not the only person who has been struggling with big losses. I hardly know anyone who wasn't before the Big V hit. For many of us, nothing was going to be the same anyway -- because life is all about change and thank you, I know all that, Buddha -- but now we're not even sure where we are on the map. For many of us, we're close to the end of the road. If all predictions come true, no family will be left whole. The next few months .... who knows? None of us can predict now.
And we do so love to predict. Oh god, how we crave knowing we'll just be OK. Just OK. Even with all I was going through before, I thought I would be OK. Now I don't know. And neither do you.
So what do we do when we can't see what's even a few days ahead? What do we do when we can't even empty our bucket lists because we're quarantined in our homes? At least I hope you're staying home unless you're in an essential job.
I can tell you what I want to do right now, in this minute. I want to gorge myself on good dark chocolate and drink a bottle of ice-cold chardonnay in the company of my closest family and friends. I want to play my guitar and sing harmony with other people. I want to watch the sun rise from the night side of the day. I want to ride my bike along the river for miles and miles in the sun. I want to dig my hands in the dirt and plant vegetables that I know I'll eat in the summer.
But fuck me, I can't do any of those things. I forgot to buy enough chocolate and my liquor cabinet was robbed with the rest of my house. It's been raining here for 2 days and a big storm is blowing up as I write. The wind is getting fierce. Sometimes I love a windy night, but after being in a tornado last spring, it's not as much fun as it used to be.
I'm just one big ball of fun tonight, aren't I?
What I have been doing is staying holed up here in our house with Coraline -- except when we can get out for a walk between rain drops. I've been sleeping in and feeling zero guilt about it. I made a list of things I want to get done and I've been clearing at least one item off that list daily. Today I tidied the linen cupboard.
I helped Coraline with her schoolwork, and we went to a live Indigo Girls concert on Facebook and then watched a silly movie on Disney+. Yesterday I installed a bidet that I bought a month ago. It was pretty funny and I'll be writing about that soon. We watched The Voice, but it was hard knowing none of those singers will ever really compete. The day before I added leaves to the compost and stirred it up, preparing for a new garden this spring, and video chatted with my daughter-in-law Dakota and my 2-year-old grandson Cassius Danger. (I miss them so much my whole body aches.) I still need to shave our standard poodle Crow Cocker and send my tax documents to Dave and wash the chairs on the front porch -- at least one thing a day that moves me toward the future, whatever it brings.
And I've been preparing for the possibility that I'll be sick for a week or longer and Coraline will need to do more for us than she usually does. I taught her how to start the washer and dryer. We talked about foods she can cook, and I made two huge pots of chicken, vegetable and wild rice soup to put in the freezer. We could live a long time on soup. It helps to feel somewhat prepared for whatever craziness will inevitably ensue. I may look back on this time and say when everything was out of control, I made soup.
Social media has been a sanity-saver, both for me and for Coraline. She video chats with her friends for hours, and I let her. They do their homework together and have dance contests. And of course, I'm in contact with many of my friends too. I think we'd both be crazy by now without our online social life, extroverts that we are. We talk to the guys who live on either side of us from the safety of our porches. Today we the house for the first time since last Saturday to go pick up some early spring greens from a local CSA. On our way home we had to pass close to the home of one of Coraline's best friends. In a blaze of serendipity, they were just getting into their car as we drove by, so I whipped down the street and we car-chatted from across the street for about 20 minutes. It felt good.
I worry about every tickle in my throat, every cough that I would normally attribute to spring allergies. I try to focus on the 80% of people who throw this virus off like it's a bad cold. I try to be like Tom Hanks, even though unlike him, I'm not even sick yet. I wash my hands a lot. I cross my fingers a cure will come any day now and then a vaccine. And I know even so, nothing will be the same.
I don't know how to teach Coraline about a world that doesn't exist yet. We'll have to learn together.
Whatever happens, we will fight to survive. The isolation feels like a terrible trick though. This is one way to break people, and we need to remember it. We are stronger together, even when we have to stay 6 feet apart.
I don't know whether to hit publish on this one. It's a post for the times we're in, but for once I'm not able to find the humor like I usually can. You've all got your own troubles. Feel free to tell them to me in the comments. I can always listen.
Stay well, my friends.
