As NEDA week wraps up (well, wrapped up), corona virus wreaks havoc on the city, the country and the world, as i exit the dentist chair once again, i am left feeling so sad. So weak. Helpless. Vulnerable.
Everything feels so uncontrollable, not only beyond my control but beyond human control, beyond science. A worst nightmare. Not even a nightmare dressed like a daydream, just a big ol' black nightmare.
As I sit on my couch, my laptop cradling my knees and quieting my soul -- the irony that my pharmaceutical advertising workload calms my mind does not escape me -- my emotion leaking out my hopefully uninfected respiratory system and out of my pores, I can't seem to stop myself from reflecting. In the world so broken, in a mind equally conflicted, the uncertainty of it all turns the room sideways and upside down and straightens it out again.
Who can guess what will become of the world now, of the broken-hearted. Will we all just evaporate or corona-contract ourselves into nothing? Is 2020 the apocalypse decade, year, moment? I cannot know, nor can you. But it seems it is in these fractured times that the most clarity and profound sadness descend themselves upon my yet-unwashed strands.
The days I've spent in environments most people would not fathom; the sterile hallways in the west part of the world. The friends I have made who I have watched go from sick to sicker; the friends I have lost. For nothing. For what. Thinner legs? Flatter stomachs? Fuck that. Concave torsos have done anything but comfort any of us; they have destroyed them and contorted themselves into the opposite of beauty or health. Yes, the friends I have lost; the laughs I have heard that are no longer.
We never know what will happen; we must live in the moment; make the most it...blah and blah and blah and blah. But no, it is really true. how I wish i could hug my mom today, my grandma. But my mom is a germ-ridden plane ride away, my favorite grandma a hugless impossibility, in her blue sweater in the sky. I love you, Grandma, I miss you forever.
The grief that broke my soul. I never believed in the physical effect of grief until it broke me into pieces, changed the chemistry of my body, my being, and my soul. When my Grandma exited this world, so too did a piece of my heart. It has gone missing and while I am no longer looking for it, it is still gone, I have simply realized it. The grief that broke my already weak body, sauntered my stomach and struck me with a blow so hard I could not get up without healing hands to lift me.
What can we do now, but wash our proverbial and physical hands, stay nourished, and keep going. "Make the next right decision." "Give ourselves grace." What can I do but be myself, my less-than-straight arrow, my still-working-through-it-but-better-than-I-was, my authentic truly trying-my-best in life, be the Rachel I always was, before all the chaos and abundance.
That is all I can do. I am still here; I am still me, and all I can do is maintain my hope.
