(This post is a series of daily letters from me to my future children reporting from the emerging paradigm.)
Dear Kids:
Entering month 4 of Covid quarantine soon (I call March 15th, the Ides of March, the moment it became clear we were really doing shelter in place) and it feels scarier now than it did at the time.
I wasn’t keeping these letters then (or journaling as much) so it’s hard to really know. While it seemed daunting and scary to set out to prevent a virus as contagious as this one, it also felt like we were all in this together and it was surmountable to really flatten the curve.
But now that we’re deep into this and so many people have given up quarantine, being really capricious about who they have mask free contact with… it feels scarier. Masks are now mandated by law except how to even enforce that when we are seriously discussing defunding the police.
Defunding the police is a vision of the world with less harm. That requires a level of faith and social services. Right now, we’re dealing with a virus and cloth barriers aren’t even fully protective! I don’t want the cops called on anyone mask or not but certainly I don’t want anyone’s second-hand capricious covid contact.
I have been going to town even less. Getting ever more intentional about how I use my time when I go into town and prepping more so I need make less trips.
I have adopted a defensive driving tact for dealing with people in public. Many folks don’t stay 6 feet away from me, so I back up. I give myself lots of time to get in and out of businesses so I am not time pressured to reach around someone for an item. I just stand back and wait for the crowd to thin. I go into town on weekdays not on weekend when tourists descend.
I make choices about my life so I can be as mindful as possible of other folks. It really feels like a group project we were all working on and, outside of essential workers, those of us wearing masks and continuing social distancing are the ones who were always doing the work on the group project in school with no help from classmates.
I don’t even watch the news but an article from the Atlantic out yesterday about 16 states hitting record Coronavirus numbers is alarming. Hey, not my state (Washington), but people are traveling all over right now.
I am doing what I can control and SMILING is one of the biggest things folks overlook! I have been studying human physiology for success, always improving Fat Kid Dance Party, and learned so much about smiling.
One big component of smiling is eye contact–if you smile and don’t look someone in the eye it doesn’t convey enthusiasm or love. If you give someone eye contact while smiling even behind a mask they still get the similar dopamine zing that they get from the full visual.
Smiling has been a big addition to my covid behavior changes around defensive driving and going slow. Just being sure to add that level of connection to my interactions with other masked people so they feel the love. No ray of sunlight is ever lost.
Plus, smiles are good for the smiler, physiologically, so I’m giving myself a boost by adding a smile to my rituals of going to town. Bust mostly, I’m keeping my human interactions to frequent zoom calls and facetimes with friends and business associates.
xoxo,
Bevin
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