Progress Report: April 2020

There’s an alternate universe where I make a joke about April, and how for 30 days, every day is 4/20. I’d talk about the first week of baseball and how good the Yankees might be. I’d talk about the last week of basketball and how bad the Knicks have been. I’d make mention of how springtime is when everyone is talking about weddings and birth, and of sun and flowers, and how much I look forward to the buzz of life finally emerging from their homes after a long winter. Things that usually matter.

Instead, we’re talking about social distancing and curve flattening. We’re talking about things that we can repurpose as masks. And we’re inside so much these days, no one really cares about how warm the weather is going to be. And through it all we live with the deepening suspicion that it’ll get worse before it gets better. The only thing that’s changed is that we talk about things that (mostly) matter. Except the definition of what matters has been drastically altered.

The change that I’m most affected by over the last month is how disconnected we’ve become. We’re separate from people we love, people we like, even from people who annoy us. Seriously, a friend of mine on Facebook posted that he misses tourists. Person-to-person contact is something we all took for granted. Personally, I miss tactile interaction. A handshake to a new acquaintance, a fist bump to a friend or a hug to a loved one. I miss the athletic, almost balletic, dance of navigating through a crowd, or moving through pedestrian traffic. I know my more introverty friends out there will think I’m crazy, but isolation sucks.

And in this time of talking about what matters, I can’t in good conscience use this space to advertise the stuff I’ve been trying to write and release for god knows how long. I miss connection, I want connection. Instead of updating you on what I’m reading, or listening to, I’m asking you.

Tell me what you have going on.

Tell me what you’ve read. What you’ve watched.

Tell me about your isolation experience. Vent, complain, interact.

Tell me if you’re trying new things, or what you’ve learned.

I want to hear from you whether you’re essential or not. I want to hear from people on the front lines and on the sidelines. I want to hear from grocers, fast-food workers, cops, firemen, nurses, doctors, who have proven that we can’t live without them (thank you, by the way, for your service). Military personnel, I want to hear from you. I want to hear from people who are using this time as entrepreneurs. I want to hear from people who spend their time making masks.

Email me. Message me on Facebook. Chat with me here. I’ll respond. The only rules are no placing blame for what’s happening (there’s plenty of time for that later) and no hate speech.

Update me on your progress. I’m listening.

#2020vision #coronavirus #covid19 #isolation #quarantine #mentalhealth #update