I’ve moved to the patio with my laptop hoping I can put together good words for you. A mosquito buzzing near me hasn’t bitten me yet.
I could tell you about a recent MRI experience, because a complicating event offers riches. I am starved for detail, for variety, for contact with strangers:
the narrow metal slab
the booties for your feet
the kind technician, only 4’-8”
the illuminated panel on the ceiling—like a church window—with vines and flowers
the low and hard knocking sounds, volumes of water sloshing
I’m inside a dam it seems.
I crave touch. My nails being filed and fussed with, even if Gina, who I think is a little depressed, doesn’t say a word. Or playing Slap Scrabble with my grandson—who at thirteen, right on cue, hides behind a curtain of hair—we are sitting on the plexi kitchen stools a foot apart.
We’ve missed a physical connection with friends and strangers, not always understanding what we lack. It’s a kind of vibration. Electricity. Presence--I think that’s what it is. Being seen.
And when we were out and about we hid our faces with masks. And we looked down and avoided people’s eyes. It’s no wonder it’s been hard to plan, to imagine, to want.
In Harper’s Magazine “A Complicating Energy: Notes on a Year Without Strangers,” the author, Elisa Gabbert suggests that we require a “daily intake of humanity. We need to be seen or else we feel transparent, even nonexistent.”
D and I are beginning to venture out. It feels odd and unsettling. There seems to be a re-entry protocol to this post-vaccination life.
We had a small party outdoors a week ago—here in this yard—to celebrate his very special birthday. It was both a celebration of D and an unfolding—opening ourselves to living beyond the narrow limits of our two-by-two cabin in the Ark. Our son, his wife, and kids who live in northern California bought tickets on JetBlue. We had not seen them in two years. Our other son who lives closer also brought his young family. We blew up air mattresses and pulled out all the pillows. My shriveled heart filled up.
In another blog post I used the word alivio to express the “easing” we were feeling after the chaotic Trump presidency and the swearing in of President Biden.
Today I see a flower opening up, revealing her delicate, private places.
I tell myself: open and engage and commit and see and create.
Consider blasting your heart open.