It's funny how it's hard to internalize something that the world has had to embrace for about 10 months, until it isn't. I mean, it was almost a year ago that we met and were horrified- yet intrigued- by Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin. We stocked up on TP, waited out the mask shortage, and socially distanced, figuring it would be a few weeks before resuming life as we knew it. Covid became global and political, and then it started to slam into our personal. We've seen the news, we've watched the numbers climb, we've been safe, we've been wise, we've done all the things. And even watching friends and family struggle- sleepless hours working in health care; losing loved ones; businesses closing doors after years of being foundational in communities; hellos and goodbyes on the phone and through glass panes- doesn't seem to solidify the "real" until you hear "it's positive" from your doctor. And, to clarify- totally different feeling (for me, anyway...) hearing those words regarding a global pandemic-causing virus than it is when the doctor says them about a missed period or morning sickness.
It's weird, too- we're always a statistic, always some number, always in some demographic category. Male, female, child of divorce, adopted, stroke survivor, middle-aged, black, caucasian... female-middle-aged stroke-surviving-caucasian-child-of-divorce... etc... but NOW, to be a part of what abcTV news calls "key metrics" driving whether or not we have a "Carolina Comeback," and to know that my data is in some system somewhere, that our case numbers are 2 of the 3,228 in Lee County...? I don't know... it just seems so strange, to me. Again, I guess it just plucks all the someone-else's-story out of the air and staples it to the forehead of my real, my now.
I've spent since Tuesday in my house. Today is Sunday, and I'm not much of a gadabout town anyway, so it's not a huge deal I don't reckon... BUT being sick, not leaving my house, being home with no options of leaving or having ANY type of guests has made this virus pretty stinking real, and pretty sucky. Add to it that we were dx just a couple days before Christmas, and the day AFTER, our 1955 pipes shot all the excrement for our family and who knows whom else's into our tubs and toilets.... it does seem a fitting end to an already chaotic 2020. I think all the hoarded TP for 2020 is now in our backyard, btw. Gross.
Also, plumbers aren't too keen on servicing a Covid+ home, by the way (as I wouldn't be, either...), which made for a fun scramble the day after Christmas. Praise God, Neil Coggins and his crew donned their halos and HazMat, fixing whatever the "it" happened to be in our lines, rendering us once again able to wash dishes and clothes, and giving us the glorious flushing capabilities we grew to miss so. Let me add here that also sporting his variation of protective gear yesterday was my husband- he put grocery bags on his feet over his shoes, rubber gloves up to his elbows, and his mask, and conquered not one but two bathtubs and two toilets FULL of backed-up sludge. I tried not to laugh as images of Cousin Eddie emptying the RV sewage replayed themselves in my mind, but honestly, that's exactly what it was. Folks, our shitters WERE full, and it all came screaming back at us through our tubs and toilets. I can handle lots of pretty gross things, but fecal matter and issues of pottying and bathrooms are NOT areas in which I am comfy. Aaron has a pretty weak stomach, too, but he sallied forth for the good of the cause, knowing I felt terrible, and knowing it had to be done... he spent probably 2 hours cleaning and bleaching and de-sludging our bathrooms. And he's sick, too?... the man is a saint. Seriously.
So what I'm noticing about the 'rona is - well- several things. Obviously, it hits us all way differently. Aaron's cough was worse than mine, my fever was way worse and longer-lasting than his; overall the virus seems to have been a little easier on him than me, for whatever reason. They're now saying there's some sort of blood type correlation... who knows... But the biggest thing, for me, has been the emotional toll. The lack of smell and taste has been more than what I would have thought of as simply an inconvenience or annoyance, and has rendered me in a state of almost shattering depression. Because I can't smell and/ or taste? What? I have found myself wandering around the house, unsure almost of who I am, what I'm doing, what I'm about... I have zero interest in movies, TV, my book... even blogging, it's actually been like 3-4 days that I've been trying to sit down and figure out how to put what's swimming around in my head into words... and what I'm sorting out is that a huge portion of who I am and what makes me ME is how sensory I am; specifically smell and taste. I realize this is probably a total "first world" situation- I mean, people are DYING from this virus and I'm bananas because I can't smell and taste?? I know. It's probably pretty terrible, but it is my reality, and here I am in the - literally- NONsense of it. I'm not a neurologist or brain expert, but I do know that smells are directly linked to our limbic system, which is where we do our emotional/ memory processing. When God was handing out limbic packages, He gave me extra, as well as an extremely overactive olfactory bulb. Good stuff when baking or producing written memoirs, but when those lifelines are snuffed out- hopefully temporarily- it is simply paralyzing. Simply put, I am lost. The strong faith in me- the Jesus- reminds me to put my reliance in Him, not whether or not I can smell or taste... I KNOW that... I do, but in the right-now and right-here of it, this part is seriously debilitating. I'm sad, I'm frustrated, I'm experiencing nothing but bland and plain and colorlessness, and the experience is blank-bleeding into all parts of me, and out of me all over my everywhere. COVID-19 is way more than a physical sick, more than a "just" a virus... it's an emotional monster truck that is bulldozing my legs and my life-breath right out from underneath me.
I wish I could say it stinks, but I can't tell.
“… I carried to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had let soften a bit of madeleine. But at the very instant when the mouthful of tea mixed with cake crumbs touched my palate, I quivered, attentive to the extraordinary thing that was happening inside me.”
-Marcel Proust, “À la recherche du temps perdu," 1913
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