By Jerri-Lynn Scofield, who has worked as a securities lawyer and a derivatives trader. She is currently writing a book about textile artisans.
After reading the following in today’s Guardian, here are some changes I will cop to post-.lockdown, going forward, From going grey to hand washing: 12 lockdown habits we’re going to keep.
I hereby reveal mine.
What are yours?
Handwashing
Like most people, prior to the onset of COVID-19. I occasionally washed my hands. Certainly after using the bathroom. And before and after cooking, too. But I’ve since realised, I didn’t really wash my hands.
Not in a way that did me any good.
Because i thought I knew how to do so, but didn’t.
Here’s how to wash your hands.
Having now learned how to wash my hands properly, it’s a practice I’ll continue.
Why?
Well, I’m not getting any younger, and coping with colds and ‘flu is more difficult as one ages. But that being said, doesn’t anyone. regardless of age, wish to dodge colds and ‘flu?
Hong Kong, which has done an exemplary job in managing its COVID-19 infections (and deaths) has also seen its incidence of ‘flu plummet this year – no doubt due to people’s use of masks and their frequent handwashing.
I also spend much of my time in places where nasty infectious diseases are common or endemic.
So, I’ll keep washing my hands -now that I know how to do so. Just one way to avoid the creepy crawlies- including COVID-19.
Keeping Track of Protein
Like many Westerners, I don’t usually keep track of the protein I eat. Usually more than enough, given the typical Western diet.
But marooned in the East, I’m confining myself largely to a vegetarian diet – cooking myself- with occasional forays into local takeaway options, including fish and other types of meat .
Subsisting on a largely vegetarian diet means I must pay more attention to my protein intake.
And for that matter, other intakes as well. Not sure how this attention to what I eat will survive lockdown conditions, as I really prefer to enjoy rather than fixate on food.
Prior to COVID- 19: Only My Hairdresser Knew For Sure
Like many people of of Eastern Europeans origin, my blondish hair has darkened as I’ve aged., Well past the point one would expect it to go grey, it hasn’t. Nor has my mother’s, and we expect her to turn 85 in August.
A couple of years ago I found myself in Bangkok, with hair striped like a tiger.
After some weeks of ignoring my predicament. I had to decide whether to go light or dark. As I was in Bangkok. a a city of few blondes, I opted to go dark. I figured the hairdressers would know how to do that. And one certainly did.
Which I’ve now done for a couple of years – with some lighter highlights. And a lot fewer chemicals.
Odd, the dark hair.Initially, I occasionally didn’t recognize myself in the mirror when I glimpsed myself, until I got accustomed to seeing myself this way.
Now, seeing myself as a brunette is longer an issue,
I can live without the highlights – whereas tiger stripes might be more difficult to ignore.
And Then There’s the Reading
Ever since I was a wee kiddie and learned to read. I’ve been a voracious reader. I usually finish at least a book every other day and I have logs to prove it.
But then COVID-19 happened, and I found I could not finish books. Even disposable ones, I still read a lot, but not longform things,
The end of May rolled around, and I only had three books in my log for 2020.
This worried me.
Since then, I’ve added six more, So I’ m back on my normal track. I seem to have broken the jam.
But what caused it? Other than the obvious anxiety over the collapse of the world I thought I knew, , I have no clue.
I am just happy to be able to read – and finish – books again.
43 comments
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Sounds interesting Jerri-Lynn—looking forward to the article!
I second the point about books. I love reading too but for some reason the ambient distractions have turned this into a few pages here, a few pages there. On the other hand I have been reading a *lot* more news and medical articles than usual so that may, in part, explain the lack of progress on narratives. Right now, surprisingly, real living needs more of my undivided attention.
I’ve also been reading lots of books – many of them which I read years ago. I find that when re-reading a book I find something I missed when reading it the first time. Of course, I’ve been reading lots of medical articles pertaining to Covid-19- (thank you, NC). I’ve also discovered how much I love watching birds – they are fascinating creatures, and I’m lucky to live in a part of the country that has many different kinds, plus a bird feeder outside my kitchen window. I’m also surrounded by trees, which I love to sit outside and just look up and see their majestic canopies. I love solitude. This is permanent for me.
Any other homebrewers in the house?
I’ve been using the lockdown to up my brewing game. Been making my own kombucha for three years, and I have a couple of gallons going right now. On the other side of the kitchen, there’s a gallon of mead that I started last Friday.
And, last but not least, there’s a Irish stout kit on the kitchen table. Will get that going over the weekend.
Yes. I like beer but I can’t drink much because I go fat. I do small interleaved batches of 10 liters of beer, which is the amount that I can “responsibly” drink before it goes stale :).
I can do a quick brew while “working from home” during the week so the weekend and evenings are Clear.
> a gallon of mead
Mead is great but not easy. I hope you didn’t boil the honey!
I hope he has a nice soft floor to fall down on when he tests it.
Nope! Didn’t boil the honey.
Haven’t graduated to making beer yet. Do make yogurt, granola, and bread; three things that are almost always industrially produced and inferior to homemade. Also, roast my own coffee beans.
Hummus! Easy to make, exc protein source and lots of variety.
Whip it up in 15 min.
Making sourdough bread. No yeast or kneading.
Fresh fruits and veggies. Summer is time to experiment and transition to a more healthy diet.
Would you mind sharing your yogurt and bread recipes?
Yogurt: use raw milk if possible. One gallon milk, heat in stainless steel pot to 180 degrees, hold for a few minutes. Remove from heat, cool down to 110 degrees in ice bath or running cold water around pot. Wisk in yeast, put in jars. Put out on countertop for at least 8-12 hours.
Bread: I’ve been using the Easy Tiger (bakery in Austin) website for recipes and techniques. I made my own wild yeast starter culture by adding one fourth cup of flour and water to a jar with a cloth over it every day for 10 days outside, then one week in the refrigerator.
Another comment concerning the Time of Covid.
I have slowly begun to become much more selective about the books I read. I used to pick up almost anything and at least give it the old college drop out try. Perhaps it is the effect of Covid’s showing we older readers that Death is coming for us all, and, in our cases, sooner rather than later. A more selective use of our remaining time is warranted. I also find that I am more comfortable with my incipient cynicism.
Perhaps the greatest thing that people are re-learning from the magisterial impositions of Covid is that we are not the Lords of Creation. For the religious among us, the words of Jim Morrison in the Doors song “The Soft Parade,” resonate today, when the Destroyer of Worlds takes notice of us, “You cannot petition the Lord with prayer!”
I have also begun to write “important” things on the big calendar hanging next to my bedroom door. An example: “Tell Phyl I love her every morning.” We are paring down our obligatons. Life is becoming simpler and more profound.
Make every moment count.
Sorry for the maudlin rant.
Rant away. I understand the need. Yet as I’m the strong one in most of my relationships – unflappable, imperturbable even – if I start to talk about how scared and vulnerable I sometimes feel, it freaks friends and family out. So I don’t do it, but instead reserve sharing my thoughts with you, NC readers
The ‘funny’ bit with me is that I was the only child for the first decade and so am a mix of “enabler” and “spoiled.” A difficult combination to work out.
As someone a few days ago remarked in comments relative to a minor scuffle in the comments section; “It’s wonderful to see the NC comments section ‘immune response’ in action.” This is an eclectic but ‘serious’ group of people participating in NC’s comments section. A sense of solidarity is evident and active, but not, as far as I can tell, in a purely ‘tribal’ manner.
Dare I say that the NC commenteriat is a “meta-community?”
Peace and Love to you from some Sothrons, Jerri-Lynn.
The lockdown aftermath of this post is odd to me.
Handwashing — were we really so ignorant of how to wash our hands? The idea of creating enough ‘friction’ to help kill the Corona virus is strange. I can’t cite medical studies … I but suspect a thorough washing of one’s hands is sufficent — not to kill virus particle, fomids, or clusters — but to remove them from the hands. I don’t know how thoroughly people washed their hands pre-Corona but I am not singing “Happy Birthday” every time I wash my hands. I wash my hands often and thoroughly now and before because I don’t like having dirty hands — they just don’t feel right. As for protein, … I probably have more than enough protein in my diet because I feel a genuine craving for meat, beans, tofu, eggs, or cheese or their like in my diet. My hair is white and I am old and I get my haircut or trim my beard for comfort more than style. My ears itch and tickle if the hair grows too far over them, and my beard catches too much of my soup if don’t trim it from time to time. As for reading — my eyes are not what they once were. Until I get my cataracts removed I much prefer audiobooks, although Amazon’s absorption of Audible and its affiliates has greatly dampened my use of audiobooks.
What I fear as changes I will continue are far different. I will not give much trust to the CDC or WHO and I will continue wearing facemasks in public — both for the safety of others and for my own safety from others and from face recognition programs. I will long harbor long feelings of mistrust of the Government and its handling of the economy. I will try all possible means to avoid Amazon and eschew Walmart. I will get my butt in gear to move myself to a higher altitude further from the Ocean and further from the City. I will do everything I can to convince my daughter to leave NYC and find a smaller city further from the coasts to live in. I may give up on politics and economics and try to find ways to quietly tend my garden and join and build community where I move — if I can. After the lockdown I will give up ‘Hope’ and instead look for new answers … a hope held too long is a curse.
Tellingly, the Greeks had Hope be the last ‘thing’ to come out of Pandora’s Box. A decidedly ambiguous message that.
Wash your hands.
Wear a mask in public.
Yes! This is another change I meant to mention, but didn’t. Thanks for bringing up the point.
Things I keep:
1) Getting up before the sun rises. This gives me time to think, to plan my day, to decide the one thing that will make that day a success if done, to relax and to go for a run on an empty system, which trains the body’s ability to burn fat. No digital device allowed until after 2 hours because digital devices are about Other Peoples thinking!
2) Shopping only twice a month and use up everything there is in the fridge. We are saving loads and living better, the time spent shopping is wasted time that doesn’t do anything that serve our purpose.
3) Using online conferencing a lot more.
4) Getting rid of unimportant work tasks. I am finding that 80% of my previous work is not necessary since I have had no complaints over not doing it because of “the virus”. The flip-side of that coin is that my management assigns work to keep their departments looking busy so at some point, there will be a discussion of the off-boarding process.
5) Replacing procrastination with purposeful activities: I can go running, do some code, fix my budget, do online training, instead of “browsing” or staring into space while moving the mouse around to look busy.
6) Minimise, Minimise, Minimise. I am beginning to think that us suckers are trading “the time that we have left”, something that infinitely valuable because more cannot be bought or created, for something that is totally abundant, available “on-demand” (for some) and therefore infinitely less valuable, which is Money.
7) The 2 hour work week. I can do everything I need to do at work in two hours per week! Now I need to fill in the rest of the week with things I enjoy doing.
8) I won’t be seeing a lot of my friends again, because they are actually not my friends. The lockdown has exposed that many we know are just people we do certain things with and outside of that setting, we don’t talk or meet.
Point 8 resonates with me too – in late March, I had the idea of talking with all the old friends I’d said I didn’t have time to call (or even text). I did it, we caught up, and there’s nothing more to say (or as Ray Davies puts it here).
Pre-dawn rising is one of my joys.
To see, hear and breathe in the slow unfolding of the day while various birds serenade the world.
My cat wanders in to monitor that.
To watch the sky lighten and to appreciate the colors as they change.
To feel the temperature change and the breezes rise and fall.
Each season has its own rhythm and scents.
Those help get the day off to a great start.
Number Five is hard for me because I ‘gave up’ time schedules organized around a business organization’s “needs” several years ago when I stopped formally working. Setting up a personal life centred schedule is difficult when one has relied on others, through work, to do the task for so long. That’s why your Point Number Six will be a key element of our lives going froward.
Covid has exposed the “awful truth” to all of us previously complacent Beta Personalities. We have given our “agency” away in so much of our lives over the years just to “fit in.” Now the “fit” doesn’t. Time to take back our “agency” and learn how to use it to our best purposes.
The death toll from Covid may not rival the Great Plagues of the past, but the effects look to be the same; a massive disruption of the social order.
There may be hope for us yet.
Isn’t there a chance a lot of us are putting ourselves in permanent lockdown? If so, too bad for everyone.
That is a double edged sword Quentin. One aspect of a lockdown is that those so isolated have the opportunity, one seldom allowed by our previously frenetic and mercenary social system, to practice some introspection. It is not easy in the best of times, but it generally leads to superior lives.
“vegetarian => lower protein intake” or even worse “no meat => lower protein intake” is a myth first forged by upper classes as meat was sufficiently rare to be a positional good and hunting was associated with dominant classes. Later, when increased productivity made animal protein more affordable, agrifood marketing took over the myth propagation…
The objective truth is that there are plenty of plant based protein available, like wheat (gluten), soybeans and other beans, and they are perfectly suitable. In Asia, it is quite easy to find soy or gluten based high protein food, often presented as meat or fish substitutes for marketing purpose. I wouldn’t call the action of putting it in your shopping basket as “keeping track of protein intake” any more than putting a beef or fish patty is “keeping track of protein intake”.
I was going to say the same things but you put it so eloquently. As a vegetarian for over 30 years, I’ve been asked “what do you do for protein?” when people find out that I’m a vegetarian. Protein intake (especially the secondary kind that comes from animals) is not healthy for humans. A sufficient amount of protein is available from plant sources, without the associated high fat and additives such as antibiotics and pesticides. Younger people growing up may need more protein than older folks. High protein intake is actually damaging, especially for women and leads to loss of bone calcium and associated minerals as the body excretes these during the natural process of bone rebuilding. (UCSF study pointed to meat consumption as the cause). Generally, less protein (from all sources) helps your digestive process.
Hi Jerry Lynn, a good starting point. I very much agree that lockdowns, for obvious reasons, have made us think twice about some many things and there are IMO some positive outcomes. For instance, almost without noticing I myself have found more strength in my mind to push for my current activity: promoting renewables (solar self-consumptiom basically but also with energy saving).
But I want to comment on another issue you mention that worries me from time to time. Because lockdowns, not only Covid-19 was contained but many other respiratory diseases like common colds and flu. As a group, these are by far the most common human infectious diseases. I am wondering if, given that immune resistance to such diseases has, in many cases, not a long memory, could it be that in the future we will see episodes of bad flu outbreaks if we collectively become more susceptible with time.
Thanks for this, Jerri-Lynn. Given the speed at which I see things around me return to some sort of normality, I’ve been wondering lately about whether the deep changes I assumed would happen would actually be the reality. Yves has talked about a W shaped recession this year, and I’m wondering if the same thing will happen in personal and public behaviour. In other words, a false ‘normality’ over the summer as people try to pretend its all behind us, followed by deeper changes if and when another surge of the virus makes everything have to reinforce previous ‘temporary’ behavioural changes.
One of my unexpected changes is regularly moisturising my hands. I don’t know whether its a reaction to the cleaning and use of hand disinfection, or its unconnected, but in March I started getting painful rashes on my hands. I started using some hand cream a guest had left behind in my bathroom and it really worked well at easing it. So I find its a personal ‘reinforcing’ thing that I know wash my hands well every time I leave my home, and then moisturising after.
A big change for me is diet – on the first week of lockdown I was feeling a bit sorry for myself and ate a lot of comfort food and drink. That couldn’t go on, so I focused on making two healthy meals a day and skipping breakfast to help with weight. I then went accidentally vegan as I’m generally pescatarian, but I couldn’t be bothered with buying milk or cheese or fish and storing them. I’ve developed a range of home made milks from hemp and linseed seeds and nuts and fruit – they are delicious, healthy, and generally cheaper. I hope I can keep this up. I am though getting very tired of my limited repertoire of curries and chillis and minestrone type stews. But I’ve found that working at home and deliberately limiting my shop trips has improved my diet considerably and helped save a lot of money. Like Jerri-Lynn, I’ve been pondering protein – most Westerners eat far too much protein, but as you grow older its important to maintain muscle mass, and this means some daily protein (or at least BCAAs). But both protein and BCAA’s seem to be associated with lowering lifespan in some studies – (a key feature of healthy older people seems to be a life of eating relatively low protein diets), so its a hard balance to get.
As others have observed above, working from home as shown me (and many other colleagues have noticed this), how much more time we all have when not wasting time with pointless office based activities. I do home gym and this alone saves significant time when you don’t have to get your kit together and go to the gym. Even though my gym is only 5 minutes walk from me, doing it online has saved me a lot of time. A 40 minutes session is really 40 minutes out of your day, not 40 plus 20 minutes getting there plus 20 minutes getting kit together plus laundry, etc. My trainer is determined to get everyone back in her gym as soon as possible, but her clients are rebelling, we all like the zoom classes. I think the message is getting through.
I wish the time down had helped me get my book reading habits back, but it hasn’t. I used to be a voracious reader in my youth, but as time has gone on the internet has chipped away at this. Almost all my reading now is grazing online. I thought I could reverse this during lockdown, but I haven’t succeeded, I still have the same three half read books beside me. The only one I read through was itself written for grazing, not a deep read (Pico Iyers ‘A Beginners Guide to Japan’ – its really his randomly collected thoughts on living in that country, without any coherent structure), which leads me to believe that this may be a deliberate publishing strategy for the future – books that resemble internet reading.
On the subject of Japan, the one big change for me is that I’ve finally started language learning more systematically. I’ve been dabbling with Japanese for years without much success, and in the meanwhile my other ‘sort of able to speak or read’ languages have withered away over the years from lack of use. I’ve finally managed to get a reasonable structure to do an hour a day on languages. I doubt I’ll get fluent in any of them, but at least I’m making a little progress.
I’m happy to say I’ve given up drinking since the quarantine began. Not being able to park my duff at the bar whenever boredom sets in has made me realize the vast majority of my consumption was just killing time, not having fun or socializing. Also, I feel great, I have more energy than I know what to do with.
While you are home brewing, take a minute to start a levain, a yeast sponge, for bread. It’s easy, makes tastier bread, and it’s more nutritious! And you’ll be ahead of the game for the next pandemic when all the yeast packets disappear again…
http://www.sourdoughmadesimple.com/how-to-make-a-levain/
re: hand washing
Is there not an inevitable downside to a long-term emphasis on hand washing, and perhaps especially so in the case of children, whose immune systems are developing?
We all know that exposure to germs allows the immune system to build natural defenses, so, outside of an extraordinary risk such as COVID, I question the wisdom of practicing hand washing so assiduously.
Of course I am not referring to vulnerable populations which are frequently exposed to unsanitary conditions.
Yes, this. While there is no doubt we are protected from the virus, not only from washing and mask wearing, we are screwing with our microbiome on our skin and in our lungs (yes, there is a balanced lung microbiome).
It is not just that “germs” (a description I do not like becasue it has such negative connotations) might help foster a robust immune system, but there is really no separation between “germs” and “you”. There is a symbiosis happening which we will never be able to comprehend.
And never mind washing, all the alcohol sanitizer use! A sterile environment is a dead environment and a sterile person is a dead person.
Washing your hands should be done sparingly, even at this time. Hand washing is a technological fix for a technological lifestyle that will have further consequences. Adn one should only wear masks when inside crowded places. The number of people I see wearing them like out in a park or driving alone in their car is silly. But it’s like everything else in the U.S, we over react, either f*ck masks or cover yourself in plastic.
Not much has changed for me, if I’m being honest. An unfortunate mental health situation means that my life is more stagnant than I would like – and that was the case before the pandemic. Early on I saw the lockdown as an opportunity to ‘get things done’, even though I’m very fortunate in that there was nothing materially stopping me from getting things done (projects etc.) before the lockdown, I felt there would be more opportunity somehow because more people were in the same boat, and there were fewer distractions from the outside world. But of course, what’s preventing me from ‘getting things done’ (sorry for the vague and bland turn of phrase) is all in my head, a matter of taking the path of least resistance. One who has some part of him that wants or allows himself to be easily distracted, will be, regardless of what’s going on extrinsically.
on reading: I am something of a literature nerd but I don’t read anywhere near as much as I’d like, and the pandemic didn’t improve that. In fact if anything my
pleasurable reading got worse. But it’s not that I didn’t read. I read loads. It’s just that most if it was NC articles, comments and links/WC content. I honestly don’t know how you guys put it all together every day.
I’m also a film/tv nerd, and approach watching films with the same concentration I have when I read novels or whatnot, but the first month or two of lockdown my viewing habits fell by the wayside. It got better though, thankfully, but the cinema has also been dearly missed (I’ve seen commenters here pour scorn on going to movie theatres before, to which I can only say that
I suppose the experience is markedly less shit in Australia? Given the option I’ll always take watching something in a cinema)
There have been a lot of videogames. Again, path of least resistance.
on socialising: I’m very much an introvert so having no physical social contact with friends and family has not been too much of a burden, fortunately, and I probably could have kept doing it for longer. The online methods of text communication generally suffice for me. That said I don’t dislike socialising or anything and I have missed people, and the easing of restrictions in Aus meant I went to a small party on the weekend to socialise properly for the first time since early March, and it was really very nice.
on food and drink: I’ve been drinking way less since lockdown started, doing it pretty much just once a week for a pub quiz (done over Zoom) and keeping it to a couple of drinks. Unfortunately I’ve gained weight regardless, thanks to the home cooking, my sweet tooth and snacking tendencies, and the reluctance to get out and about (or to have nowhere to go – I usually exercise by walking/cycling, but I’m not great at doing those things if I don’t have somewhere to be going. Also the small gym in my building has been shut down, which hasn’t helped.
I miss going out to drink. I often do it on my own, and ironically get quite a bit of reading done when I do as well, and get to observe and hear all kinds of things, and have amusing little interactions with strangers. Again, despite being introvert, I very much enjoy being alone amongst other people, for some reason. That’s very much been missed since this started.
As a fellow Metal Health survivor, same here, nothing much has changed. The one thing I miss is going to coffee shops since that is where I get most of my social good stuff, and like you being “alone among others” helps me a lot.
I have been saving so much more money though mostly from my friends not being able to ask me out to eat somewhere that I should not be able to afford.
But I do miss being able to live in my van.
The French polymath Bruno Latour wrote an article challenging us to not return to our old ways after the pandemic. The list of questions is similar to this post and has been translated into 12 languages.
http://www.bruno-latour.fr/node/852.html
A recent interview in The Guardian
“Bruno Latour: ‘This is a global catastrophe that has come from within”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/06/bruno-latour-coronavirus-gaia-hypothesis-climate-crisis
“The influential French thinker explains the politics of the Gaia principle, the problems of post-truth and how coronavirus gives us a model for spreading ideas
In the early days of the lockdown, philosopher Bruno Latour wrote an essay for the AOC cultural online newspaper. “The first lesson the coronavirus has taught us,” he wrote, “is also the most astounding: we have actually proven that it is possible, in a few weeks, to put an economic system on hold everywhere in the world…” That essay, translated since into at least 12 languages, has encouraged many to reimagine how different the world could look if we learned from this experience. It has also solidified the reputation of the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po) emeritus professor as one of the most influential thinkers of our age.”
Yes! I should have read all the comments before posting (below). If we are to survive as a society, we must learn to live in this new, less impactful way. I’ve enjoyed it greatly. Although it is only a start…
Thanks for the article. Enjoyed reading everyone’s comments. As for me, 1. I hand wash a little more than before the virus, but am not so concerned about picking up the virus due to all the research coming out that shows it is mainly transferred via aerosol. I do wash my hands upon entering the house after any outside trip. 2. I do use hand sanitizer after every external to home visit, like a store, meeting, gas station. I keep it in the car. 3. I wear a mask in any store I enter. I don’t wear one outside. 4. I no longer shake hands. Will probably never go back to doing so. I do an elbow bump or more often a namaste greeting and goodbye. Our libraries are still closed here in SC so I read a lot of ebooks, Cloud, Hoopla, etc. Here in South Carolina positive cases of Covid are ramping up at an alarming rate, setting a daily record for positive cases almost every day. The trend has gone from just over 4% a day on May 27th to over 10% today. Our governor foolishly opened everything back up and there is no requirement to wear masks. I feel a reckoning coming this fall or sooner. What I miss most due to Covid is travel. I have cancelled multiple trips this year and the future for overseas travel anytime soon looks bleak. (sigh)
More than anything, I’ll probably remain aware of my space around others and their space around me. Before the virus, I was never the type to crowd but now I’m acutely aware of when others are too close. Like others, I’m more cognizant of thorough handwashing and I’ve also taken to waking up early. Oddly, I’ve been going on more walks than before the virus and don’t think that will stop.
I’ve taken this Corona opportunity to psychoanalyze myself. Using old reruns of TV series – the best one is Law and Order. Maybe because it takes me back a few decades; maybe the slang and attitude of the script – anyway it’s almost like a form of hypnotism. A gateway. In the last very quiet 2 months I’ve had more deeply-buried memories pop back into my consciousness than I thought existed – and now that I’m old I’m looking at all of them with older and wiser eyes. It has been an amazing experience – getting to know myself all over again. I probably would have lapsed into this introspection anyway – they say it automatically happens when you get old – you start to remember your childhood, but you forget if you took your pill. Funny.
The CV19 lockdown is a view into the future for humanity. If we are to make any dent in climate change, this kind of shelter in place, telecommuting, minimum consumption, enjoying the local bounty and friends and neighbors is what our lives must become. We can do it. We just need to learn this lesson and retool our economy and expectations to match. That is what I hope we take away from the lockdown, and what I have taken away, that less isn’t really less.
Thanks for the post, Jerri-Lynn. I can only echo what a lot of the always-excellent NC commenters have said.
Proper hand washing, to be sure, is a habit I’ll keep. (I really liked that same WHO video — if one uses that technique, it’s way >20 sec., and doesn’t require subvocalizing a song.)
I’m an introvert but I was trying before the pandemic to “get out more,” trying to start dating again, etc. While I’m constitutionally better equipped than most to handle isolation, it’s not healthy. Texting or even the occasional phone call is not the same. I find myself envious of those who are married, with or without kids. (But OTOH, being quarantined in an unhappy relationship would be, well, worse than solitude, I suppose.) All the same, the loneliness is wearing on me.
Exercise is a conundrum. I used to be enthusiastic about it (CrossFit, or, more accurately, my modified version that my sister calls ElderFit), but my mother got very sick late last year and died in late April (not Covid-19 related); all the “stuff to do” got in the way, and I can’t seem to get back to some kind of routine at home. I keep paying my trainer both to support his small business and in fear that if I stopped, it would lessen the chance of ever getting back to a 3-4 days / week routine, if that makes any sense.
I take comfort in hearing from those of you who have difficulty reading books. (It’s not just solipsistic me!) I was determined to get off the ‘net and read more even before the world ended, with a special emphasis on reading fiction. (I find that non-fiction doesn’t have the long-term effect on my mental health that fiction does. As interesting as non-fiction can be — just bought ‘Macroeconomics,’ by Wm. Mitchell et al., and am excited about it, for god’s sake! — I need to read more ‘stories.’ (I could be trapped here for years and likely not run out of novels to read — but I’m a slow reader.) As much as I love this site — most of my reading / news-gathering is done here — the internet is a problem. It’s definitely affected my ability to read books; not sure how much of that is from endogenous (if that’s the right word) cognitive changes and how much from the ‘internet effect.’
I will keep using masks indoors. A lot of people here in Tennessee still don’t and are proud of it, especially when you get even a few miles away from Nashville. I hate the fact that mask-wearing is a political issue. And there’s of course a strong correlation between the use of the word ‘overblown’ when discussing ‘the virus’ and not wearing a mask. (A close friend lives in Lambert’s neck of the woods in a hamlet north of Bangor. She told me that, out of habit, she put on a mask before going into a convenience store / takeout restaurant in a slightly-larger town that’s a few miles farther north into the country. She was initially surprised but then became a little ill-at-ease because (a) no one at all — customers or workers — was wearing a mask, and (b) the looks she got were definitely not friendly.
Although I miss attending live music events, and and occasionally holding court at local brewpubs, not a lot has changed in my life personally…..Business is another matter. I quit talking about becoming an absentee business owner, and actually became one. I am most fortunate to have been able to assemble a team that does not require my supervision or input, more than sporadically. I am fascinated with the ideas surrounding how to transition the business to eventual ownership by the current managers. I need to assure that my wife and I have enough to take care of our needs, not saddle the new ownership team with oppressive debt repayment, etc. After all, labor should have control of the fruits thereof……
Personally, I always have a mask with me, but have manged to avoid using it but twice in the past three months. We produce and preserve 50% of our food. The rest is delivered. The local brewery loads the cases in the back of the car, touch free. I have not entered any retail establishment, except my business, in 3 months. We like home cooked food, and have no real need for restaurants. We don’t require the level of entertainment that we once did, when we were younger. I will not wait in line ever, for any reason, so I have learned to live without the monthly Costco run.
When I don’t leave home for a week, and we don’t have visitors, I haven’t even needed to be too worried about hand washing. My exercise comes from maintaining our acre and a half lot that is heavily landscaped, and has an organic garden, fruit, etc. Also, a nice pig pen, chicken coop, and a stall for a cow I intend to grain fatten this fall, since I despise the taste of grass fed beef. So, I don’t need a gym.
I don’t read nearly as much as I thought I would, and am watching waaaaaaay too much Netflix. I get nearly all my news from NC. The home haircuts are acceptable. I cancelled the Baltic cruise we had scheduled for next year, but I was never a big fan of cruise ships to begin with. I may never fly on an airplane again, so I am not sure how the 50/50 split of life between the US and Northern Italy that I was contemplating would ever happen. I will find different things to contemplate. Right now, I am contemplating a ham sammich, and a nap.