First, an update on my life. Initially, as an essential worker, I continued to go into the office (OhioHealth’s Kobacker House). While I found it hard to leave home each morning, once I was out the door, I found it easy and empowering to turn my thoughts to what needed to be done. Being a part of a system preparing for and addressing COVID19 needs provided fulfilment to my day. There was chaotic but passionate energy all around me. Eventually I was permitted to shift much of my work to home and now am doing 4/5 days there. As an introvert, I love this. Also I’m most effective with few, if any, interruptions when working on larger projects. Fortuitously, at the end of February, Anna moved home to enable her to save and purchase a home of her own. This means that we have each other during this time of sheltering in place. What a gift that has been.
This time would have been incredibly difficult without Gerke if not for the support and presence of my daughters. If you know someone who lost a loved one in recent years, and is living alone, make a point to reach out to them (with socialing distance in mind). Recent deaths are extremely difficult, and for those of us whose loss is a year or more in the past, it can also be very triggering to face isolation and all the stories of loss and pain. People are facing these losses without the usual support practices following a death (like HUGS, attending funerals, sitting shiva, etc).
In some ways, we’re all grieving loss right now, not just for the changes in our daily lives but anticipatory grief for what lies ahead. I’ve had to go back to those grieving relief practices when I become overwhelmed with it all: writing/reading, music, and beauty. Writing helps me grope around in the dark and find the familiar and defined within the unknown. I also find comfort and enlightenment in others’ words. Music and beauty lift my spirit and ground me in ways that I don’t understand, but know is essential to my well-being. Below are some links that have provided me some solace, inspiration, and strength in recent days.
Music – go to YouTube and search “playing for change song around the world”. There are a dozen or more videos of musicians from around the world that play/sing in their own “arena” and with editing become a part of a large world-wide song. (Parents, check out the ones with children singing/dancing.) Here are three of my favorites (click on the title)
Inspiration from others’ writing:
Jan Richardson: Holy Week - http://paintedprayerbook.com/2020/04/08/easter-sunday-we-begin-in-the-dark/
Beauty: the tree in my front yard
