I am Not Over the Pandemic

The afterglow of graduation and ensuing parties has worn off, while exhaustion and a shocking heat wave knocked me flat for a few days last week. Despite my ongoing efforts to keep gratitude at the forefront, deep-seated frustrations and bitterness caused by the pandemic have re-emerged, like prickly weeds bursting through a crack in the sidewalk.

At William's final home swim meet, already worn down by emotional goodbyes to parents, their boys, even the pool itself, I overheard junior parents talking about their sons' pending college searches. I immediately left the area, overcoming the urge to scream "test scores don't matter !" "there's no scholarship money!" and "everything has changed!"  Junior parents don't need to hear further words of warning, at least not from me. The coming year and their college search might be more conventional than ours was in a historic 2020. 

After a night of restless sleep, dreaming of missed swim races and evaporating ties to high school meets, I walked with two friends in the cool of the morning. We exclaimed over the lovely summer flowers and happy dogs out for an early stroll. But when the conversation turned to religion, I again felt lightning flashes of frustration. Online church services and regular emails helped me only marginally during the lockdown, and I now feel separated from our church, divorced from my spirituality. 

Despite good intentions to meditate, I never resumed my long-dead practice, and my early morning alone-time during the pandemic was most often spent reading headlines. I realize that my spiritual disappointment and frustration should be aimed internally and not my place of worship, which did all it could to support people virtually. That knowledge doesn't diminish my disappointment or feelings of isolation.

How long will it take me, will it take our society, to recovery from the pandemic and resulting lock downs, social distancing and revamping of social norms? Are we even out of the pandemic now?  I wrote that our graduation party for William and his friends was "post-pandemic" but I fear I spoke too soon. Headlines continue to mourn deaths in India, wail about ten thousand Olympic volunteers defecting in Tokyo. My grievances continue to emerge at odd times and to eyebrow-raising effect. I hope I'm just reflective enough to place blame on the historic virus and not the people or institutions which - like me - were just trying to survive the best they could.