Throughout this difficult period, this newsletter will be a daily look at what it is like to actually live through this moment, until this moment is over. It will feature brief opening remarks from me every day, but will mostly be stories from you about how this is affecting you, your family, your friends … your daily life. (The regular weekly newsletter will continue uninterrupted.) Email me your story at williamfleitch@yahoo.com.
After months of putting it off, we decided to finally renovate our kitchen. I love our home, but it is old, and the kitchen was small, cramped and dated. We had some money saved up, I knew it would ultimately add to the value of the house, we’re not leaving anytime soon so we might as well fix this place up … all the boring reasons people in their 40s have been redoing their kitchen for generations.
My wife is a decorator, and a good one, and she knew precisely how long such a project would take. Because she lives with a madman who starts clawing at the walls when too many people are in his house making noise when he’s trying to write, she got the permits, did the math and figured out that the exact right time to start this project would be at the beginning of a month in which we would be in Florida for one week for Spring Break and I personally would be out of town for a week or two for the NCAA Tournament and Opening Day — way the hell away from the whole project. This set the start date at … March 3, 2020. That was the day they demoed the whole kitchen. Upstairs, I could hear them wailing away on it with sledgehammers and drills all day. I gritted my teeth: At least I’ll be gone for most of it. At least it will be over soon.
As it turns out: March 3, 2020 was perhaps not the best time to begin a home construction project.
So here we all are, one month in, all locked in here together. We are still eating microwaved mac-and-cheese, still using plastic forks and paper plates, still washing whiskey glasses in the bathroom sink. There are many memories we will all have of this unprecedented time in American history. It just turns out most of ones in this house will involve reheating yesterday’s takeout and jamming wine into the mini-fridge. So little of what we are all going through will ever be funny. But that part will be.
Here are today’s stories. Send me yours at williamfleitch@yahoo.com.
From John W from Los Angeles:
Yesterday I got furloughed from my job, which wasn't entirely unexpected. I live in Los Angeles and manage construction projects for a fitness company whose locations have all closed since there's no money coming in. There's not a pressing need to continue building new gyms so I have been deemed "non-essential." When I think of others continuing work in my field—building hospitals, medical facilities, literal tent hospitals in Central Park—I'm the first one to raise my hand and self-identify: "Hi, I'm John and I'm very non-essential." But it still stings to hear it, ya know?
I would have thought being furloughed would have been my biggest fear and frustration yesterday, but every time I think I have it bad, I can turn on the television and watch the leader of my country accuse doctors and medical professionals of stealing scarce life-saving materials during a pandemic that was 100 percent foreseeable. My livelihood is contingent on the fitness world re-opening, which feels like it will be take ages because of extending quarantines and incompetent federal leadership, so I can't imagine the obscene amounts of rage I would feel if I was a medical professional being asked to step up for the entire country while the Executive Branch ties one or both of their hands behind their backs on a daily basis.
I, like a lot of people, am using this time to re-engage with old hobbies/habits (reading, running) and discovering new parts of life that have been there the whole time. I'm taking walks and seeing neighbors (from a distance!), and due to both of our travel schedules being impacted, my roommate and I have spent more time together in the last two weeks than we have in the last two years. She's a delight to be quarantined with and after overhearing her on conference calls all week, I hope she ends up running the company she works for. She would be great at it.
Here's hoping our medical personnel continue to be the heroes they've always been and if any of this fine newsletter community knows of essential construction management needs, I've suddenly got a lot of time on my hands and would love to pitch in.
From Randy Shemanski, Dunmore, Pennsylvania:
I have social anxiety. I don't like crowds, I don't like talking to strangers, and I have a very small circle of good friends, and that's how I like it. My social anxiety gets so bad sometimes that I don't even want to meet those few friends for a drink. (Boy, what I would give to be able to meet them for one tonight.) Now, social anxiety coupled with COVID anxiety means a trip to the grocery store is pure torture. I try to go as late as I possibly can to avoid as many people as I can, but I still turn down an aisle with one person on the other end, and I'll turn around and leave that aisle. Forget six feet, I don't want to be within 60 feet of someone I don't know. I was searching for something on a shelf the last time I went and a guy came down the aisle and started looking at things a few feet from me. I was so unnerved that I almost started shaking. I can't imagine trying to get groceries in a hard-hit area.
On top of that, as my anxiety level sky-rocketed while I was in the store, I started considering getting things I didn't need right away. In other words, I considered hoarding things—just like the people I shook my head at when toilet paper disappeared a few weeks ago. I didn't consider it because I never thought I'd be able to get those things again; I considered it because I didn't want to have to go to the grocery store again. It's an awful feeling.
The other secondary affect that I've felt has been even tougher to deal with. People I know, some whom I consider close friends, have said things recently that make me question their sanity, and my choice in friends. Whether it's a lack of understanding of the seriousness of the situation, a blatant disregard for social distancing or just ignorant comments, it's making me see people in a new light. Perhaps that's a good thing; maybe they are not someone I actually want in my life. But it's still difficult to find myself questioning friendships that were formed years or, in some cases, decades ago.
I know that if these are two of the biggest COVID-related problems I have right now, then I should consider myself lucky. But I also think that the lasting effects of this are so far-reaching that life has been altered forever, and in different ways for different people.
From Sox in Israel:
This is probably the worst possible time for this to happen to me, but also the best. I believe I would be a wonderful hermit: I am taking everything seriously but am very much alone and seem to be okay with that.
I quit my job in June. I am about to turn 37 and this past year has been anything but normal. I moved to Israel, alone, at the age of 21. For the last 10 years I have been very involved in the Dairy farm on my kibbutz, which I have been managing for three years now. Slowly loneliness and stress took over my life, and it took me quite some time to understand. I was breaking down before I left work, knowing I needed time to straighten my head. I went on a plane to South Africa and traveled to some amazing places with two of my good friends. After Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, I returned to try and unwind who I truly am. Genealogy grasped my interest and pushed me to travel around Eastern Europe during the Jewish holidays in the fall. It was extremely emotional in certain aspects and I am still trying to truly understand what I experienced. I came back knowing that now I needed to reevaluate what I want to with my life.
My answers are still not known. Just as I felt like I was finding a direction to move in, Covid-19 stopped the whole world, precisely when I began to start moving again.
In one way, I am comfortable. All my savings from working non-stop for so many years allow me to live minimally and not feel stressed. I am a single person living with my dog of 10 years, next to Mount Carmel in the northern part of Israel. In another way, I am very depressed and still not sure of who I am or who I want to be. I am close to 20 years from my high school graduation, yet I feel that I have fallen back to that time in my life. I do not yet know how to move forward anymore.
Recently, I was watching lots of sports and surprised at how okay I am with the world on pause. Apparently, we changed our clocks last night and I had no knowledge or care that it happened. My days pass as I focus of having light out of my window or darkness. Time is not important. The day does not matter because they are all the same. I have been searching for myself in the months before quarantine, so I feel comfortable being alone with not much to do but my thoughts and YouTube or Netflix. I try and keep an emotional journal using my typewriter. With all things in the past tense, my future is still so unknown to me because I still do not know who I am. The only constant recently is words and language and reading and writing. The strength of literature is amazing as it proves to me once again how much I feel out of place in this world.
Send me your stories at williamfleitch@yahoo.com. And please: Be safe, everyone.
Best,
Will