Life in the times of cholera

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?

Today my first lessons with the Zoom platform. Videoconferencing, which means that I could see the students (they could see each other as well). Apart from praising Zoom (or its CEO) for reacting so quickly to the needs of the time by lifting the 40 minutes limit in the free version, providing school is the user  - so that we can hold longer lessons - apart from the technical ease with which the platform is handled - it is a bonus, to see. To hear. To react to the nuances of the face and the body. I was so thrilled, my eyes watered slightly - and I did not even try to hide it. 

Some of the students confirmed this feeling, saying in the after-lesson note that it was wonderful to be able to see. It made the school experience even more closer to "normality" for which we fight.

Do I regret that this pandemia made me learn new things? Not at all. I would probably never wanted to experiment with online work. I remember being loath to edit in google documents, when Obywatele dla Edukacji worked on some petition. Now I can do it easily, not because I learned, but because the inner unwillingness has been conquered.

That we will come oout of this purge changed, was clear from the beginning. Some aspects of the changes are beginning to get clearer...

As I (and no doubt half the population) am discovering, working from home sitting at the computer results in being tired much faster, than when the similar job is executed in "real world" - at school, at the office...

Perhaps it is being alone? While working with people, we have these short, hitherto not even noticed breaks from the monotony of the task - even a short glance at a colleague, or a passing sentence about the weather, the dog, the traffic... getting up for a cup of coffee gives another opportunity to move and sure, we can do it at home... but it is somehow different. 

So, at our school lessons will be shorter, to give all of us opportunity to get up, stretch, really stretch... may be go for a power walk (remember, alone!!!) between sessions.

Meanwhile, looking out of the window - Sem the black cat, all sleek and proud, is gliding across grass, perhaps hunting for whatever is hifing under the dead autumn leaves. The sky interspersed with clouds, promising balmy weather. Open the window, breathe in, spring is here!  We could have forgotten, but honetly guys... SPRING HAS COME!

I was also thinking about the difference in experiencing the limitations - adult people probably deal with the ban on meetings better than young people. If I remember well my own high school times, the joy of life was organising events, sitting in cafes, in parks, at homes, talking, listening to music, horseplaying. It is pitiful to imagine an "online party" when you cannot get in direct proximity with each other, perhaps embrace, perhaps push playfully...

I would love to hear from young people who sit cooped up in their homes. How far does the Internet wizardry stretch in filling the psychological need to "be together"?