Boy, it isn’t easy keeping spirits up during a time like this. I haven’t had a major emotional crash or anything, but I’m struggling like so many others to find energy or to be silly and laugh. I stayed in my bathrobe until early afternoon, seriously considering skipping a shower altogether and rewearing yesterday’s clothes, even though they were less than fresh and painfully unflattering. I compromised, showering but putting back on yesterday’s shirt, that wasn’t all that dirty, and some shorts I usually wear to sleep in. No one but the Man who lives here was gonna see me anyway. I haven’t worn makeup in weeks, I rarely brush my hair (it’s still so short and unruly as it grows back in, there’s no point), and I have to actively work at it to remember to brush my teeth every day. I know there are millions of people fighting this exact same battle right now. But knowing I’m not alone doesn’t make it go away.
I read some mental health professional describe this lethargy we are all experiencing together as a natural response to trauma. Neither fight nor flight is appropriate when we have to hunker down like this, and the primary remaining option is to shut down. Of course we ought to get up and exercise, keep our minds active, and find ways to comfort our souls. But we also need to accept what we are going through as normal and healthy and we must not beat ourselves up over it. If you need two naps during the day, even though you haven’t walked farther than from the couch to the fridge a couple of times, don’t hate yourself over it. Be kind to the person you will be quarantined with most closely—you. You won’t escape your own company. Do what feels right, when it feels right. This is going to be plenty hard without negative self-talk making it worse.
I have joined the ranks of quarantine cooks. I mean, I was always experimental in the kitchen, but I’m really rocking it lately. Somebody this morning said they had made lemon-blueberry-ricotta pancakes three days in a row. Naturally as soon as I read that sentence, I had to try it. I had lemons, a few blueberries, some ricotta left over from lasagna on the first day of serious isolation, and a bag of gluten free pancake mix. It was on. I don’t know why I never thought to make them this way before, but I will never go back to the old ways. I am forever changed. By the time evening rolled around I was back at it, this time making nachos supreme. I had avocados that were on the precipice of over ripening. It was now or never. Thank goodness I still had more lemons for the guacamole, since I didn’t plan ahead well enough to have procured limes before I shut myself in the house. Cooking has been the one thing that keeps me in the moment, feeling still connected to the Before Times. I want to cling to it, use it as an anchor and a pressure valve, at the same time. It will be there for me, or so I choose to believe.
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