They said we needed to pack up our stuff & adapt to a new work from home life. Going through the motions while running around like the headless chickens we felt like, we barely had a moment to think of how surreal & strange a life we were about to start navigating. When it came to moving forward, we were told – hey! keep going & we’ll get back to normal at some stage. This is immediately met by those who don’t want that normal back. The ‘what is the new normal?’ debate brigade come out in full force and reminded us that indeed, we have more work to do.
We all know this could be a long time away. That’ll be the night, though! When we find our way back to Copperface Jack’s with a Yagerbomb in one hand & signaling the dj to play the latest cringy pop tune with the other. We’ll lie on our sitting room floors nursing our hangovers the next day & check in with ourselves reflecting on what it was like during pandemic when we couldn’t get that drunk or wild because of the limits set on us.
Our hopes of finding a clear next step makes us anxious at the thought of identifying our future path & oh my, the amount of future paths we can take.
Which one are you contemplating today, by the way?
No need to be overwhelmed though, we’ll figure it all out. Or if we don’t, we’ll keep seeking & searching while having redundant ‘what if’ conversations about our futures.
Speaking of ‘what if’ conversations, oh how I wish I’d been told this in my earlier years, there’s a Pandemic on the way & it’s going to be mega WEIRD. Somehow, the possibilities about our futures didn’t encompass this as a possibility.
Mary Schmich was right.
“Don’t worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.”
Fast forward to post-covid times. We’ll all talk about how weird it is & how this time in our history will make some school books in years to come. Meanwhile, we’ll be lying on some beach with people sitting less than two metres away. We’ll stop randomly during conversations to go and wash our hands yet again and highlight to our friends that well, things haven’t gone back fully to the way they were before.
As we move into Winter-time, the evenings will get shorter, our energy may drop & indeed, we’ll reassess all the things two or three more times. It’s a great time to be opportunistic. What can we learn? What does this mean & how lucky are we?
Watch this space as I talk through ways of managing through Pandemic times in our Winter world.