Although I received my COVID vaccination in March 2021, I have continued to shelter-in-place except for a road trip with family to California in mid-June. Optimistically, I set July 1, 2021, as the date on which I would brave the new world and get outside of this personal bubble that has been in place since March 2020.
Like many others, during my time staying at home I adapted to doing essential shopping online. However, I did not do what I consider elective shopping online. I saved that for the time I would be free to shop in person. While sheltering, I made a list of all the things that I wanted to shop for when I could finally go out and feel relatively safe.
Beginning on July 1, I set out to get myself some “retail therapy.” From furniture to kitchen utensils to hair and skin products, I indulged my desire to shop and felt absolutely wonderful that, though masked, I could comfortably go into stores to browse and buy.
I think I’ve been coping well with the isolation but, while shopping, my feelings surprised me. It seemed to me that being around other people, in the flesh, triggered dormant emotions that I can only describe as a sense of being vitally alive! For example, though I think I’m usually polite to store employees, during these excursions, I was extra polite and friendly. My behavior was akin to how one might react when seeing friends after an extended period of time. My smile, though no one could see it, never wavered at annoyances that might have caused consternation in the past. It never faded, no matter what obstacles were thrown in my path that might hinder me from reaching my shopping goals.
Sadly, my euphoria was short-lived. With recommendations to continue wearing masks even when vaccinated, the apparent strength of the new virus variants, and breakthrough infections in vaccinated people, I am, once again out of an abundance of caution, only engaging outside my home when absolutely necessary.
While feeling pandemic whiplash like others, I’m preparing to make the best of resuming my digital life and will reignite my self-reflection and self-care.
Notwithstanding my mature attitude about being isolated, again, in some of my reflective moments, I wonder if those of us who shelter in place more vigilantly are being profoundly changed. Is our hypervigilance about avoiding being infected or infecting others making us less inclined to seek out opportunities to be physically present with others even when it will be safer to do so? Is our success in adapting to the requirements of this pandemic a harbinger of the crisis to come as we become less and less social beings? Are we getting more comfort and satisfaction from being alone with ourselves than we once experienced being with friends and family? Are we reveling in the utopia of isolation?
Or, is this pause in heretofore normal social contact allowing us to awaken to the joy, appreciation, and satisfaction of being in the same physical space with one another as sentient human beings?
We will have to wait and see.
Gwen Dungy 