This was the week that one moment slid into the next. No discernible order. Thursday followed Monday, then came Tuesday. Wednesday and Friday seemed to have put on their masks and slipped out the door. It was like living in a Tom Waits’ song. It didn’t help that it rained all week so there was no visual difference between day and night. I also had a wee eye infection so had to wear my glasses, which don’t give me the best distance vision (& of course I could riff on the symbolism of that for a good long time, but I’ll leave it for now).

At one point, I was folding laundry and realized that I usually have some running dialogue about what happened on the day that I wore said item of clothing. But as I held up a pair of chinos and stared at them…nothing. No idea what was going on in the moment they were trotting around on my person. I stared at the gathering layer of dust on the surrounding surfaces and thought, I really should clean. I stared at Dennis and said that out loud, then we turned around and went about whatever it was we were doing. I made a sad little batch of cookies (which Dennis claims are actually tasty but let’s agree that he’s biased. Or just desperate for cookies.). I did not even once tune into any of my enjoyable online fitness or dance moments. Just didn’t. My meditation has been a pretty regular loop of “focus” and “start again.” I had two very exciting covid-19 dreams that in no particular order contained breaking isolation for a lousy bag of candy and a lot of elders physically fighting each other (no masks in sight). Words have been treating me funny too. My current fiction, Deacon King Kong, has been serving me up words that aren’t there. Quarter became quarantine and pinnacle = pandemic as if my subconscious were determined to rewrite the book for current times. (Speaking of what lies beneath, came across a great podcast this week courtesy one of my all time favorite writers, Caitlyn Moran: This Jungian Life. So. Good.)

On the flippity flop, I had the pleasure of talking either face-to-face or voce-to-voce to some of my all-time favorite people and even met some new ones during a good friend’s zoom birthday party. Was also invited into an FB discussion group “Civility in American Politics” for a friend who is completing her master’s thesis. What timing! She lives in Austria currently, but the other people in the group are spread all over the contiguous states. In her introduction, while laying some ground rules, she talked about suspension not as it translates to being on edge in a mysterious way or even dangling ten feet above ground by a bungee cord, but rather the act of suspension in expressing opinions. The difference between immediate reaction to a comment or action versus the act of suspending your reaction as you listen, gather the information in your intellectual and emotional place, then respond accordingly. I’m of course all for this definition of suspension. Agree wholeheartedly and strive while wishing upon a star to exercise it. I write that while watching a couple of my neighbors stroll down the sidewalk barefaced as an Amazon delivery man (fully masked and gloved) slips by and they seem to want to talk to him much closer than six feet dictates. And my brain screams People, what part of this death-dance do you not understand? idiiots. effin’ dangerous mofos. what’s wrong with you? You see where I’m going with this suspension thing. So hard to pause before reacting. And don’t even get me started on my inner dialogue when reading the daily newspapers.

So even though I’m still a bit fuzzy on what day it is and am pretty sure I just spotted a pile of dust in the corner grow a mustache, I am endeavoring to practice some suspension in order to keep front and center how incredibly and insanely committed a majority of humans out there are at keeping their loved ones, themselves, and also total strangers safe in this tsunami. I send us all big buckets of love and patience. I’m now going to go try and bake something. Wish me some success! Have a great, safe week, all you lovelies!