Emerging from the pandemic cocoon, part two

It's been about a month since my previous post about this unguided process. A month later, things still feel strangely liminal for me. Time still seems somewhat amorphous, as it has throughout the pandemic. 

I previously tried to come up with some sort of framework for activities to return to and gradually ease myself into post-pandemic life. One of the first things in terms of branching out socially was to attend some sort of outdoor gathering that included people I know (as opposed to strangers). I thought that would be the easiest starting point. Last weekend, I had an opportunity for that. It was overall enjoyable yet it also felt vaguely disorienting and afterward, I felt like I needed a week to recover from that sudden flood of socialization. 

socialized with friends, in person (outside, vaccinated), I will now use these next 2 days off to recover from so much being around people ohgod please let me just lie down in my dark silent house

— Heather Wms Gaona🐨 (@heatherwgaona) May 2, 2021

I'm still gingerly grappling with fully emerging from the cocoon and frankly, I don't think I've made much progress. The pace of this process is turning out to be slower than I might've hoped when the pandemic's apparent end wasn't actually at hand. Even in stores that have rescinded mask requirements, it still feels very natural to me to wear one myself. Now being fully vaccinated, at least I'm considerably less paranoid around others who don't wear one anymore.  

I suppose it was naive to expect that I could just readily snap back to an approximation of my pre-pandemic life. I thought I would have a vibrant and invigorating summer, but I'm still shrinking away from... so much. Things I gamely did in the past now feel like such a tremendous effort that I just don't have the stamina for now. 

I feel like I dreamed the pandemic, dreamed the uprisings, dreamed 600K deaths. Maybe everything feels heavy because there’s an unacknowledged spiritual residue in the air, a loss ungrieved, a change we should have made.

— El Norte Recuerda (@Vanessid) June 12, 2021

The pandemic didn't cause copious emotional eating for me, so my actual clothes still fit. But this current process of emerging from the pandemic feels kind of like trying on something you haven't worn in a long time and finding that it just looks and feels... off, somehow, that it doesn't fit like it used to. I am trying to be optimistic about the future and will myself into not becoming a permanent recluse, but it's going to be a process, it's going to take effort.

I thought I would be happier now and it turns out that I'm not, which is disappointing. I didn't expect that I'd feel this way. This is actually the first time I've experienced such jarring disappointment that's fundamentally different than any past disappointments in my life. At the same time, the apparent source of the disappointment feels oddly mundane, unlike other things that could reasonably cause significant disappointment: things like not getting a job you really wanted or losing your possessions in a fire. 

Those are the closest examples I can think of that somewhat embody the nature of this post(ish)-pandemic disappointment -- things that affect your life more deeply and for longer than minor, everyday disappointments. If you miss a train or the pasta sauce you wanted isn't in stock at the grocery store, you generally get over that in a day or so, at most. But this post-pandemic disappointment is not so easily shed. 

Maybe it's a manifestation of disenfranchised grief over the less tangible losses of the pandemic. Ostensibly, I had an "easier" time of the pandemic because (thankfully) no one in my immediate circle died or even got sick. There are so many others who were not as fortunate to have relatively stable living situations over the past year and a half. And yet, the pandemic was still a stressful time for me to live through -- minimizing or dismissing that isn't useful. 

Thinking about it now, before the pandemic I had never been so persistently yet also somewhat abstractly and indirectly afraid for my life and health. There was always the looming possibility that I might catch a potentially deadly virus, despite the cautions I took. In the event that I did theoretically contract covid, I couldn't predict how severely it might sicken me. Maybe I would've had a minor case and no lasting health effects, or perhaps I would've been severely ill (not to mention the possibility of chronic covid) despite my relative youth. There is no way to know for sure. 

In light of the pandemic's memento mori, I feel I've perhaps become somewhat more indifferent and fatalistic about life and death: at any unpredictable moment, one may succumb to an unexpected death. While there are certainly plenty of things we can do to prolong our lives, there is always some element of chance regarding the potentially fatal things we can't control. Our lives can be so expansive yet also remarkably fragile at the same time.

Rhetorical: how do you proceed in life when there are no good options? The pandemic is waning and I expected I'd be happier now, yet I'm not. 

Further reading and listening: 

Do Not Re-Enter? from Addison Del Mastro's newsletter The Deleted Scenes

No I'm Not Ready, from Anne Helen Petersen's newsletter Culture Study. This is from March but still feels quite relevant to me.

If Your Brain Feels Foggy And You're Tired All The Time, You're Not Alone, from NPR

Twenty Four Hours -- Joy Division, a very fitting song for bleak and depressing moments of life