Spacious Solidarity Blog: Day 13

Last night I started coughing and couldn’t stop so I took an antihistamine before bed. I end up sleeping in until 11am because the pill I took can cause drowsiness. I hadn’t realized.

After coffee I also learn that it can give you constipation. I look up whether coronavirus can also cause constipation. No, but it can give you diarrhea. I’d rather have constipation.

I stay in bed until the early afternoon, reading the news and scrolling through Facebook. At some point, I remember my dream. Trees are blowing over in the wind. One after the other. Big strong oaks and tall plane trees snapping in half like twigs.

Now I’m watching the sky change before my very eyes. The wind’s picking up, the deep blue I woke to succumbing to dark gray. We decide to go for a walk before it gets worse.

I convince my partner to return with me to Abney Park. They’re not sure. Sometimes sketchy men hang around there. I tell them it will be fine. Yesterday it was mostly families and joggers keeping a safe distance, taking care.

 On the way, we see more children’s art in the windows. Multicolored paper dolls smiling and holding hands.

Once in the park we catch sight of two little girls in matching blue tutus, riding identical hobby horses. They are smiling and giggling. Their adults are taking pictures of them against a backdrop of graves.

I remember being about that size and staying with my grandparents at their house on the beach in Chile. The garden was built into a steep hillside with a switchback running through it. It teemed with bees bobbing in and out of bright orange poppies, vibrant purple lavender, fragrant yellow chamomile, and tall, proud birds of paradise.

I took to riding a hobby horse through it while waiting for the grown-ups to get ready for the beach. I can almost smell the eucalyptus and pine trees in the forest across the road, the one you had to walk through to get to the beach. I can almost hear the waves crashing on the shore.

She died almost two years ago now. The house has since been sold.

Further down the track two young women are having a conversation. One on a bench, another stood a safe distance away, although the intimacy between them is obvious. We imagine they’re friends who have arranged a date in the park. Or maybe lovers.

As we reach the far end of the park where less people roam, we see a man sat on a bench on his own. Walking past him I try a smile. He looks at us intently but does not smile back. For a moment, I don’t feel safe and we quickly pick up our pace. My partner comments that he might be looking for a hook up. That doesn’t make me feel any better.

I remember reading an article by Italian writer, Francesca Melandri. She’s telling us, the UK public, what our immediate future looks like. She writes that we will feel vulnerable when we go out, especially as women. I see what she’s getting at. Not that I didn’t feel vulnerable before. But there’s something about the eeriness and edginess of now that has encroached on my confidence.

We’ve run out of a few things, so on our way home we decide to stop at the grocery store. Avocados and kombucha, olives and chisps. None of these things are essential but they are what I like and what I want and I’m going to get them while I still can.

We have to queue to get into the shop, at a safe distance of course. At first we’re not sure we’ll be allowed in together. We quickly decide my partner will go in and I’ll wait on the street. The owner’s stood at the door, waving people by like a traffic guard. We reach the front and as the next person leaves he waves us in, together.

I immediately regret the decision. The aisles are narrow and it’s impossible to stay 2 metres away. We separate to get this over with as soon as possible and meet back at the till where luckily there is no line at all.

The cashier is wearing a face mask and gloves. We exchange the usual pleasantries as she rings us up and I make sure to look her in the eyes when I wish her well. I mean it and I want her to know that I mean it.

Later, on the phone with a friend, we are talking about trauma. She reminds me that I had planned to do less this year. I had wanted to spend more time turning inwards and healing old wounds. Now that I’ve got all the time in the world, I feel resistant to such things.

The present moment is traumatizing enough.

Immediately I’m aware of the unnecessary dichotomy I’ve created. Why can’t I heal old wounds while experiencing new trauma? Life continues to throw up difficulties and there is no waiting for the perfect moment.

I decide to flip the script. What if what I do now could both get me through the current crisis, while also healing the past?

I remember what I teach. That the habits of the past come to bear on how we meet what is arising in the present. We easily slip into these well-worn grooves. I remember that my past includes both moments of resistance and indulgence, as well as moments of abiding with and acceptance.

How I am meeting the current moment is conditioned by both. Parts of me are still cycling through denial, anger and sadness while other parts are patiently witnessing, with curiosity and love, and choosing connection over isolation, spaciousness over narrowing.

I resolve to keep bringing awareness and love to my current experience, wearing those grooves even deeper for the challenges yet to come. I know that by doing so, I am also reaching back in time and healing the trauma carried by younger versions of myself. I am now holding those younger versions of myself with awareness and love, forgiving them for not having the resources or skills to do that for themselves.

I remember that ultimately time is a social construct and that in practice we can always step entirely outside of time. We need not be bound by it.

Later my sister calls. She’s been driving around town collecting baby monitors. Apparently with all the PPE, alarms, and machine noises, the nurses in her COVID19 unit are finding it hard to communicate with each other. So they’re going to try using baby monitors. She’s already collected fifteen.

After dinner we watch The Invisible Man. The plot’s of full of holes, like a sieve, but the cinematography, writing and acting make up for it.

I can’t help but think the threat we now face is like an invisible man, stalking us from the inside.

Before bed I call my Dad. He tells me he is not sleeping well. Awake in the middle of the night. He doesn’t have to tell me because I know him so well that he is worrying about the state of the world. He doesn’t want to die before this is all over. He’ll worry about us from beyond the grave. He won’t be able to rest in peace.

I tell him there is nothing to worry about. That we’re going to get through this. I want to believe my own words, but as they fall from my mouth they sound trite and woefully inadequate for the moment.

We’ve gone into a role reversal and it’s now me who’s talking him down. Only I’m not half as good at it as he his. I need at least 30 more years of living until I’ve got the knack.