Life in the times of cholera

So we don't have to get up every morning at some unearthly time and make haste to get to school looking ravishing to middling acceptable (depending on which cultural trend you aspire to). So we are not getting as much homework as before - at least part of the teachers' community has heeded the caveat of the psychologists, warning, that too much time spent on intellectual effort in the circumstances of outside monotony and not enough physical exercises is countereffective... and since we cannot leave our homes unchaperoned, we have an unsurpassed excuse to open the smartphone/tablet/iPod/laptop (the last seemes to be going out of vouge - too "adult"?). 

We should be happy.

Are we?

We are hearing reports of unease on all fronts: medical, social, political. Our parents and grownup relatives are anxious. Are we even "not tired", although there is precious little to get tired of?

Are we not exhausted?

Easter break is spent cooped in the same four walls, when quite a number would travel out - even if we did not exactly cherished the "family" visited or visiting... it was some change. New or nearly new faces, different set of topics. 

Now we stew in our everydayness. Bored to - perhaps not death, but hopelessness...

Happy Easter!

I do not know about others, but I have just finished a run of 6 hours of quite demanding work. Online teaching, as opposed to physical classroom setting, keeps me on my toes constantly. Might be something to do with the unusual interactions, who knows... I can see he students' faces ahd hear their voices, but I lose most of body language and it is quite conceivable that my "perception channel" is going into overdrive trying to compensate for the missing data.

Anyways... guys, he weekend is almost here. Two days to dispose of anyway I like.

(Actually, not for me, I have some obligations, but I mean it generally)

Pandemia or not, hurray for the weekend - O My God It's Friday!

Three weeks gone and the hope that it will all be over soon is vanishing - soon there will be no shred of the initial excitement at the unexpected change of life. I know there was this feeling, that , naturally, the virus, the danger - but there is SOMETHING HAPPENING! Ayayay...

and now the "happening" turned into the "everyday brings something worse" and the situation has soured. It has finally dawned on the average teen-me (and a lot of adult-me's as well) that we are imprisoned in our houses/flats... spending more than the usual amount of time with the dearest who, when taken in an extra-strong  dosage, may still be dear, but get on our nerves about hundred times more than ever before.

Frustration boils over and - there should be some outlet. We are looking for outlets. 

Adult people around are convenient outlets and it is as it should be, that is one of their functions in critical times. I am remembering the tales of the war told by my parents, both sixteen years old in 1939. They did not know it then, how they used their parents to vent their negativity on. They have seen it - looking back, from the perspective of years and... from the safety of a peaceful country. 

It would be perfect if the frustrated shout for help was met with the invitation to a dialogue. Talking to the dearest brings hope...

So all the media are providing full coverage of coronavirus-news, complete not only with the (rising) number of fatalities, official information of the latest laws limiting our freedom to move about, but also "human interest" stories of mothers who unknowlingly infect their children because they had coffee with a chum who had happened to have visited a friend whose husband's work partner had traveled to Italy some weeks back...

Plus heart-rending warnings like the one recorded by Kasia Kowalska - who had to give permission to intubate her daugther over the phone, because Kasia is in Poland and her daughter is being treated in a hospital in England so obviously... Kasia cannot fly to be at her side in this critical time.

Question: is it really necessary to consume all of these?

Question: is your (teenage or adult, whatever) psyche ready to cope with the tsunami wave of fear-inducing snippets?

Question: how to ration our access to the media-pandemia-menu?

Technically it was the third weekend of the "Life in times of Cholera" - since closing Polish schools. Probably the first one, though, when we really experience firsthand the changes, as the legal limitations have introduced real changes for millions of people. Until then - well, it was mostly quarantined unfortunates who knew how (apart from getting sick) the pandemia feels like. After all, who normally takes part in events where more than 50 people meet? 

But Saturday the weather was balmy, inviting for walks, for meeting friends. Suddenly you cannot meet friends. You cannot enjoy walking in major parks (which is true idiocy, since doctors insist we SHOULD get out and about, while the administration closes down numerous - and spacious! green areas). You cannot get on any public transport conveyance unless you luck out to find a seat between two unocuppied ones. If not, out you go (and start walking, friend - it is what doctors advise, after all).

Plus, the numbers grow and become uncomfortably close to your skin. You might want to visit relatives - but what were they up to during the week? Shopping, perchance? Therefore, one of them might be infected, though still thriving... and you could come back home invisibly changed... 

Discomfort. Awareness. Have we already started asking big questions: WHY did it happen to us/me?