Hardening Off

Is it really over? Is the new normal, the same-o normal or what? What’s going on?

According to the This Morning Show I was forced to watch recently in the waiting area of a car dealership, we’re heading into another roaring twenties. Behind footage from the frenzied party scene from the Baz Luhrmann version of The Great Gatsby, Gayle King and anchors reported that we’re entering boom times, fashion will be saucy, and everyone wants joy. 

A small voice within me squeaked, Sounds great, and was immediately pummeled by louder internal voices yelling, Whoa! Wait! Actually, those voices were barely articulate. Rather, I felt raw, skin-rippling, nerve-shredding, agoraphobic anxiety. The world is opening up, the people are wanting to dance the streets, and I want to hide behind a rock. The few times I’ve reentered society in recent days – an intimate maskless tea party, a couple of trips to Brooklyn, and one to NYC – I felt as vulnerable as a snail without a shell. I’ve had my two shots, but I’m not ready for full throttle social life yet. 

What happened to me? Does anyone else out there feel skinless?

We went to Manhattan on Memorial Day for the first time since the shutdown last March. On March 15, 2020, we took an excursion to the city after rescuing our daughter from Brooklyn. She had decided to quarantine with us at home, her dad and I had decided to pick her up rather than have her risk exposure to the virus on the train. That day, the streets were empty. So, we decided to explore Manhattan in a pandemic because we could – there was no traffic. We sailed over the Brooklyn Bridge and up the west side. It was wonderful. It was terrifying. We popped into Fairway for provisions then went to our bunker in the burbs. What we thought would be two weeks turned into nine months before she’d return to her place in East Williamsburg. It would be another couple of months before we’d all be vaccinated and feel free to come and go between Brooklyn and our home in Nyack. 

Our trip to the city the other day – specifically the Village and SoHo, our former stomping grounds – was to meet up with relatives who had flown in from Chicago. We were seeing family again – wonderful! There was bumper to bumper traffic again – awful! There were hordes of pedestrians, there were few masks – oh, well. The makeshift street dining was fabulous; the number of dark windows and locked doors (businesses that didn’t survive) was not. The way I felt in it all – odd and a bit timid.

Something changed in me during the quiet. The slow down gave me (and a lot of folks) a chance to go within and birth someone/something new, and I don’t exactly know who or what that is, but I do know that I’m tender and not quite ready for prime time yet. It’s like I’m a greenhouse sprout and I need to go through the hardening-off process before I can be moved outside. That means short, measured, consistent exposure to the elements. It also means being gentle and nonjudgemental with my process. 

Do you feel me? It’s not that I’m phobic about COVID; it’s that I feel socially awkward like my civility muscles are weak. Plus, I’m just not sure what the rules are or what is normal now.

One of the sessions in my Write From Your Heart course is an exploration of 2020. I created the content  because I want to understand my pandemic experience and maybe shed some light on my tentativeness about reentry. If I find out anything share worthy, I’ll let you know. 

Meanwhile, I do look forward to seeing you in the flesh soon and hugging unabashedly again.