Spacious Solidarity Blog: Day 23

Last night on Facetime I mentioned something to my sister about being on the frontlines. She remarked that she doesn’t see herself as the frontline. She sees herself as the end of the line.

She says it’s me who’s on the frontline. Everyone staying at home, we’re providing the first line of defense. By the time people get to her its life or death.

Right now Boris has a 50% chance. 50%.

My sister’s hospital didn’t like that the staff had taken things into their own hands by procuring hundreds of baby monitors so they could communicate with one another over the noise of all the machines in the ICU.

Instead they’ve bought this really expensive, fancy system. Everyone gets their own device that supposed to recognise your voice. Once it does, you can use your device to call out the names of any of your colleagues and it will connect to their device.

Only problem is, my sister rarely knows the names of the people she’s working with these days. There are so many traveling nurses and just-out-of-university graduates rotating through her unit on a daily basis that she doesn’t even have enough time to learn their names.

But that doesn’t matter because my sister’s device doesn’t recognise anyone else’s name except Michelle’s. Her entire shift the only other nurse she can ask for help from is Michelle. Michelle is taking it in her stride.

This morning begins on Zoom with a friend who has just been diagnosed with breast cancer. She wants to hear more about my experience and any helpful tips I could share about how to get through.

She knows that her experience will be different because of coronavirus. She doesn’t know what her treatment plan is or if she’ll even be able to have treatment. Given the circumstances, she’s taking the news remarkably well.

I am humbled by her grace.

Talking with her, I realise that I’ve conveniently put my cancer behind me since this crisis began. Part of me knows there is more to process, more meaning to make, more to cull from the experience, but I’ve been derailed.

Everything’s been derailed.

I’ve noticed the last few days I’ve broken from the format of my usual daily digest in order to reflect on things that have been calling for my attention. It occurs to me this morning that this break from the norm coincided with my monthly period.

It came on Friday, exactly 28 days from my last one. At least some things can still be relied upon.

I have endometriosis which means I get really painful periods. I also get really, really, really, really, really grumpy for days. Days before, during and after. Today is the grumpiest of all which means tomorrow I’ll start to feel better.

When I’m on my period I am more tired. So tired that sometimes I need to take naps. I knew it was coming because on Thursday I was exhausted. So exhausted that I ended up taking a two hour nap in the middle of the afternoon. My partner got me up for our daily walk at 5pm and by 7pm I was still feeling drowsy.

All I wanted to do was go back to bed. Instead I had to rally because I was teaching an online class.

I’m good at rallying. My father taught me well. As kids, if we woke up feeling ill, he’d make a deal with us. Get up, have a wash, dress and eat something and after all that if you still don’t feel well you can go back to bed.

Of course, once you’re up it doesn’t make sense to go back to bed, so I learned early in life not to listen to my body and to simply push through.

Keep calm and carry on.

I am reminded of something the Queen said in her speech on Sunday evening. She referred to British people’s “self-discipline, quiet, good-humoured resolve and fellow-feeling.” When I heard those words I felt woefully inadequate. I don’t believe I have any of those qualities except maybe sometimes a bit of fellow-feeling, although I would never call it that. Then again, I’m not British.

A good friend and co-teacher often comments on my ability to bounce back. Many a retreat we’ve led I’ve ended up down with a cold. But somehow, when it’s my turn to be up front again, I’m able to galvanise the energy required.

I’m grateful for this capacity because it keeps me from being too self-centered and reminds me that sometimes mind over matter can make all the difference.

It’s interesting to negotiate the balancing act between not giving in to self-pity and taking care of oneself.

The only time I really feel bad for myself is when I’m on my period. I decided a long time ago that its better to surrender to it than try and push through.

When I’m on my period I let myself sleep in, take pain-killers, curl up in bed with a hot water bottle, and eat lots of crappy food like chisps and chocolate.

When I’m on my period I massage the pressure points on my ankle connected to the womb. I remind myself that this pain is a result of the remarkable capacity of my body to create life.

When I’m on my period I’ve got a really short fuse. Sometimes I can almost feel the hormones raging through the body. Television ads make me cry, I get frustrated at the drop of a hat, and god help anyone who gets in my way. Unfortunately for my partner they’re the only one getting in my way these days.

I’ve been known to write snarky emails, chastise cyclists or motorists who blow past me as I’m about to cross the road, lose my patience with customer service representatives on the other end of a phone line, and swear at people who cut me off on my bike.

I’m not blaming my period for any of these behaviours. I just know that sometimes the best thing to do is remove myself from situations where the potential for me to behave unskillfully is far higher than if I just stay home under the duvet.

I’ve learned its best not to work, go out or try and be productive when I’m on my period.

I do still try and work with my mental states. But the problem with being on my period is I often also lose any capacity to care. I don’t care enough to even try.

I also happen to be at my most creative when I’m on my period. And if it coincides with a full moon, watch out!

Maybe the next time I get my period this will all be over. Except they’re now saying we probably won’t come out of lockdown until May.

In the afternoon its back to Hackney Downs because we’ve only got an hour before I’m leading another online meditation. As we cross the park I see a young woman with her shoes off, eyes closed, slowly walking barefoot in the grass under one of the large horse chestnut trees.

I smile at seeing someone doing a walking meditation in the park.

After passing her by we hear a voice calling out my partner’s name. It’s the young woman. We go over and stand a safe distance from her as we have a friendly chat. Turns out they know each other from when my partner used to work at a near-by Buddhist centre.

I introduce myself and she introduces herself. I tell her I appreciated seeing her doing walking meditation. She says she is enjoying social distancing. It’s how she usually lives her life. She likes space.

I like space, but social distancing is not how I usually live my life.

As we part we agree that we’ll see each other again in the park sometime soon. I’m reminded of something a Samoan friend once shared with me. That in his culture there was never any arranging to meet up with friends. You simply trusted that you would run into them one day, perhaps walking along the beach, and then would be the time you hung out with them again.

At the end of our walk we see a Muslim family, two men, two women, a toddler and an infant. They are kicking around a soccer ball. The women, one in a hijab with the infant on her hip and the other in full niqab, are better than the men, kicking the ball hard and high, followed by deep, roaring laughter as the men go chasing after the ball. I ask my partner if they’ve ever seen anything like it before and they laugh and say they haven’t.

Later while leading online meditation I can hear my neighbours on the doorstep talking loud and mundane. Through the whole 30-minute meditation. I have to go back to my patience and tolerance practice.

Whatever you need to do.

I can always mute myself between instructions.

Before bed we download Maleficent: Mistress of Evil. I’ve already seen it but my partner hasn’t and I don’t mind seeing it again. About 10 mins into it they’re fast asleep and I’m engrossed. At one point, a character hands Maleficent the spindle of the spinning wheel and says,

“Curses don’t end, they’re broken.”

At that Maleficent disappears the spindle and breaks the curse.

Coronavirus broke the curse. Most of us were asleep and now we’ve been rudely awakened. Something’s cracked open that cannot simply be pieced back together. Instead, something else will have to emerge.

Like a phoenix rising from the ash.