As we prepare to come together virtually this week, I want to open the space here for you to share all of the ways you’re encountering personal, physical, geographical, mental, emotional, academic, creative, etc. challenges. I’m especially curious to hear how you’re creating time to focus on your own self-care, on your intellectual pursuits, on creative work, all against the pervasive backdrop of C19. What are the questions you have of one another right now? How is your home being converted into a place where you must function across all the parts of yourself, and where is the space for your life as a student? Describe your nook. How will you create self-discipline and focus in your current home context? What are the stresses contending for your attention? In many ways, this is a time to practice boundaries, not just literally (through social distancing), but within the intimate spaces of our homes. And so maybe also we share how other activities are emerging to provide us sustenance right now: cooking, hiking, poetry, films, music, etc. How are we seeking and finding pleasure or joy, even amidst the sorrow around us? Where do we find comfort? Where quiet? Where connection? Where stories? What do you miss / long for / imagine / grieve / feel hopeful about right now? We will meet on Zoom to have discussions of literature and writing, but we will not de-prioritize the complexity of all that we’re going through as we resume our academic paths. Keep your comments brief, even if just to share 1 element of your new reality, or 1 thing you did this week, 1 thing you felt, 1 idea revolving within you.
4 thoughts on “Daily Life during C19”
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Coming home and immediately starting to juggle grocery lists, benefits paperwork, emails with landlords, 5th grade homeschooling, and general life logistics again made me realize how much I lived in a Middlebury-shaped bubble the past few semesters and how quickly I grew accustomed to that bubble. On one hand, it allowed me to completely devote all of my attention to being a student, and while a part of me does miss that quiet space, it’s also a space somewhat removed from reality. Just like how good writers continue to write in the backdrop of competing demands and bewildering circumstances, I’m seeing this as an opportunity for growth (for leveling-up!) that will only give me stronger muscles to lean on in the future.
Even cooped up in my house, where I’m most comfortable, I find anxiety won’t just go away. I’ve been baking a lot. I have a sourdough starter and am learning how to work with it in bread and pastries. It’s a calming and delicious routine. We have also been doing a lot of garden and this time outside is invaluable; the wind and the sunshine and the small seeds and my dirty hands. The world keeps spinning and the grass keeps growing and I am grateful. I’m not very disciplined with school work which is ironic because I attended a partially online middle school so you would think I would have this down. I don’t, and actually wished I would never have to do online learning again. But here I am and it’s another learning curve that I am going to have to accept. I think I might spend the next few days finding my nook.
This week I found a letter that my fourth grade teacher sent to me around the time of my high school graduation. I hadn’t spoken to her since elementary school, and despite the fact that I knew she likely sent the same type of letter to all of her past students who were graduating as well, it was still touching. In the letter, she recalled that in her class, I was always reading, and she hoped that I continued to read for fun throughout middle school, high school, and beyond. I realized that I actually had really stopped reading for fun, at least in the latter parts of high school and upon entering college. After re-reading her letter, I began to reading novels for pleasure this week, and I was so surprised by how much comfort and happiness these books brought into my life in such short of a time.
One path toward joy for me has been returning to activities I used to enjoy as a younger kid. Yesterday I tried to remember how to crochet, with so little success that I had to laugh at the crooked, hole-y knot of yarn on my lap. I’ve been playing songs on piano, the sheet music scrawled with my excited nine year-old handwriting. Revisiting memories like this not only helps to pass the time, but gives me little moments of childlike joy that remind me how simple contentment can be.