Sitting With Myself

I am an extrovert by nature.  I love people. I love being in community.  I am highly social in every sense of the word.  Being with people feeds my spirit and gives me energy.  I am respecting the social distance protocols. I am finding new ways to accomplish my work for a marginalized population in times of social distancing. I am using all reasonable care.

I am grateful during this time for technology.  I am not really tech savvy myself.  (writing a blog is about as high tech as this gal gets!)  i am however blessed with a very tech savvy company and church community.  So work meetings continue via our computers and phones.  And today, we had a church service that was highly attended virtually.  (funny aside:  my work laptop does not have a camera, my home computer does.  Boy was I glad I had combed my hair this a.m. when I realized that everyone  at virtual church could see me!)

However it was sitting in service that i realized that i had not taken time to think of how I feel during this time of pandemic.  I have been very busy at work.  I have been busy at home helping my wife to handle her anxiety and stay calm.  I have been finding things to occupy the kids who are used to such a busy life.  i have been trying to calm a teen who may not have a recital the first year he landed a lead role. I have been checking in with my sister in law who is receiving chemo and has a highly compromised immune system.  I have been trying to reassure my mother who is very anxious and flashing back to WW2 and depression era memories due to the lack of resources available.  I have been working at planning creative meals around the things we have been able to purchase during the shortages.  And somehow in there, I lost sight of looking more deeply into my own feelings.  A week or so ago I told my kids all about how this time would be our "Walden" our chance to be more fully present with ourselves.  And I haven't been.

Today was a chance to do that.  It wasn't exactly comfortable. These are scary times and I was forced to admit that I am scared.  I am an older parent (even though I would like to believe I don't look it!) While I have no underlying health conditions, that does put a certain level of risk in the equation.

I am a planner.  I am feeling at sixes and sevens because I can't really plan right now.  I don't know what the world will look like in July so I have not made reservations for camping as I intended to.  If our state locks down and I need to use all my vacation time to keep paychecks coming into the house, we may not be able to take that time.

I also realized when we were virtually in community at church today just how much I emotionally need others.  I need to see faces, hear voices, and share stories.  This morning's service went a long way toward filling a void I did not really know I had.

And yet, thus far I am really blessed.  My immediate family is all healthy.  My mother and my FIL and SIL remain healthy.  I have heard that my sister who lives across the country has the virus but is recovering at home and has not required hospitalization.  We will get through this and though the world will be changed irrevocably by this experience, I have to believe that the resiliance of our human spirit will see us through.