Friday, Covid 19, Quarantine

This thing began in Wuhan China end of November.  It came here in late December.I’ve been in self quarantine for, I think, three weeks.  I’m here with Gilbert in my home. Gilbert doesn’t tell time. He ‘s never learned to use a calendar or a watch.  Heis world revolves around this meal, next meal, this ball, next ball, lets go sniff for Fifi. I’d lost some of my sense of smell but seem to be reflecting on my dog and getting some of it back.  There’s something right in the expression, ‘you’ve got to stop and smell the roses’.

This quarantine is a major ‘halt’.  Crashing in through the back of my skull and right up through the centre of my heart are a lot of thoughts and feelings that I’d forgotten or lost or just not paid much attention to.  Really positive nostalgia thoughts today.  I’m grateful a lot.  I can be so whiny and needy so as not to remember all the wonderful times and gifts I’ve known. I take so many things for granted.  Gatherings of people.  Moments of comfort. Joy. The smile on a face of a friend. The dog cuddling beside me sometime near dawn.  Walks.

I’m not sure about the whole ‘return to normal’ thing. It’s not going to happen. I don’t want to go back.  It was already in transition and I’m moving on to the next chapter. This stop seems to have given impetus to creating a new person and planning a new adventure.  Life is a journey and an adventure. It’s the metaphors we live by that give it meaning. It’s so much more about perception.  Just because its been some way doesn’t mean it has to stay that way.  We can change.  

I’m always asking about this Godness. It’s a word, an idea, a feeling. C.S. Lewis said, stop looking for the architect in the wall. There’s a beingness to God, a creator, that sense I got with my first child microscope of looking into a huge world in a drop of pond water.  It’s all perspective.  The Creator is one of the many names of God.  I’ve considered so many and settled on Jesus, friend, love.  The idea of stoicism and hedonism mirror. I’ve been given a life to live. I don’t remember asking. I may well have designed this particular life myself. Each life has it’s inherent merits. Others see what we don’t see. I’ve envied the relationships of poor people, the mutual dependencies and they’ve envied my freedom not appreciating the terrible loneliness. In turn I don’t appreciate the stifling bonds of family, friends and community.  The oldest law of the world is the ‘Chinese law of the fish: there are big fish and there are little fish, the little fish must be fast and numerous.”  

‘Stand up and you make yourself a target’.  ‘Steal a little and they put you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king.”  I fear the hierarchies and the authoritarian realms.  I don’t quite understand how I’ve survived, frankly.  Not only must there be a God that loves me there must be people in power who appreciate variety. I know there are those who like the goose dressing masses to be dressed in drab.  But I’ve not been as successful as the ‘obedient’ while I’ve not been unsuccessful.  I can’t truly imagine which way my life had gone, looking back, today if I’d not done what I’d done at the time, often against conventional wisdom. 

Now it’s time to carry on.  An attitude of gratitude is very fine.  I’m thankful today for so much, even this time, of reflection and lack of busy-ness. The dog thinks these walks are spectacular. I might have left him at home and headed downtown for some non essential errands. But now I’m going to do the essential shower business, get dressed and have an essential walk with my friend.  He’s blind and old and has a sore back but he loves to listen and sniff, making the best of what he has.  I don’t think he thinks about his loss of vision. I’m sure he doesn’t think how he appears to other dogs either. He just keeps on trucking, sniffing and listening.  I’m going to try to focus on having God and Dog in my life, being sandwiched between the unseen love and the seen love, and maybe listen more.  And smell.  I really must savour fragrances, especially in spring when the world is blossoming anew.  

Hallelujah!