Covid Crankiness

 

The virus makes me cranky for many reasons, one of which has to do with the way our language is changing.  I hear people speaking about how things will be when we get “back to normal,” and, in my cranky way, I feel obliged to point out that “back” and “normal” are words which must be removed from our everyday lexicon because we will not be going back anywhere, and because what once was normal was often not good for a great many people. Nor for the environment.

At the same time, we are having to get used to a batch of new words: self-isolating, curve-flattening, social distancing, infodemic, covidiots, doomscrolling, etc.

With the virus numbers rising it’s hard not to get into doomscrolling, while we try to sort through all the disturbing news and conflicting information. As Nicole Ellison pointed out in a recent issue of Wired Magazine, there's a “lot of demand on cognitive processing to make sense of this. There’s no overarching narrative that helps us.”

https://www.wired.com/story/stop-doomscrolling/

Our activities continue to bring us new words. Many of us are spending a lot of time zooming and hoping to stay away from zoombombers and, at the end of the day, needing to settle down with a couple of quarantinis.

Even the Oxford English Dictionary broke its usual cycle of adding new words every four months so as to add a slate of new words and terms which have come into use during the coronavirus outbreak:

https://www.9news.com.au/world/dictionary-coronavirus-oxford-english-new-words-added-social-distancing-flatten-curve/1b89a0bb-8295-47f9-a739-d472865fdf2b

It’s understandable that, at this time of unprecedented change, new words become necessary. We need to change with the new world and the new words.

What I don’t like is the way some old words are being used. My friend Bill drew my attention to the overuse of the word pivot, for instance. Until now it was used primarily to describe the central point on which something turns or oscillates and, only secondarily, as a verb meaning to turn, as if on a pivot. It was used infrequently. Now any change is called a pivot, and the word appears so frequently in news about politicians that most public figures appear to be whirling dervishes.

We are dealing with constant change, and maybe we're all feeling and behaving like dervishes these days.

I’m now described as compromised, because of my respiratory and cardiac issues. Compromise used to mean a settlement of a dispute or accepting standards that are lower than desirable. Sometimes it meant the weakening of principles, or a shameful or disreputable concession.

These days it’s used primarily to refer an impairment to the immune system. People worry about visiting me or having me participate in certain activities because I am compromised. They check up on how I am doing because I am compromised.  I’ve heard the word compromised more in the past 5 months than in more than 7 decades, and I don’t like it.

It implies that someone is fragile and vulnerable, which is not how I like to think of myself. Nor do I think of myself as a person who easily lowers her standards.

On the contrary, with regard to the virus, I respect the advice given by our health professionals and I follow the rules. I won’t compromise my principles. On these, I will not pivot.

Do new words and changed usages really matter? Probably not. Language evolves, and we must evolve with it. I’m ready to make that concession. I’ll make that compromise.

But I myself refuse to be considered compromised.

And covid crankiness encourages me to complain about it.

The New Deadly Sins

 

 

The idea of the Seven Deadly Sins has long been of interest to me. I can’t remember when I first heard of them. Maybe in The Canterbury Tales, in which The Parson refers to them and offers remedies against them. There are references to the deadly sins in Faust, with Mephistopheles presenting a show of them to entertain and tempt Faust.  

The representation of them in the images in Hieronymus Bosch’s painting of the Deadly Sins and the Four Last things (Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell) has always stayed with me.

https://arthistoryproject.com/artists/hieronymus-bosch/the-seven-deadly-sins-and-the-four-last-things/

I've prided (which is the worst sin, according to Chaucer’s Parson) myself on my ability to quickly recite the Seven Deadly Sins: Pride, Ire, Greed, Lust, Envy, Gluttony and Sloth. This is a trick which results from my habitual acronymizing, hence PIG LEGS.

Through the years, I’ve been guilty, to a greater or lesser extent, of each of those sins.  I regret those misbehaviours, and yet they don’t seem so very bad to me. They’re certainly none of them attractive behaviours, but the list is a bit old-fashioned. In the crises we're facing today – the virus, the climate, the economy, racism and violence -- there are much worse sins.

I propose a list of New Deadly Sins which are worse, because they are much deadlier.

And let's make it simple by focussing on three main areas:

1. For starters, Complacency and Carelessness are the deadliest. That’s why the virus is spiking again. I heard an interview with someone in Australia who was asked about the causes of the spike which resulted in a declared state of disaster and new lockdown measures: she answered in one word: complacency. We were congratulating ourselves on how well we had done, she said, and we got careless and started to ignore the guidelines.

Complacency and Carelessness are what we're seeing here in our province right now. We think we're doing well, and we just decide to forget about the rules so as to enjoy the pleasures to which we are accustomed.

These sins are closely related to two others: Smugness and Selfishness, which limit our thinking and prevent us from being responsible citizens.   

2. Cynicism and Disrespect are increasing, perhaps as a result of virus fatigue. People ask: do the experts really know what they are talking about? And, if so, why is there so much inconsistency?

Becoming cynical and disrespecting experts can lead to foolish theories about conspiracies and hoaxes which may result in very deadly behaviours. Sometimes one's own death. 

3. Nostalgia is deadly. Looking back to how things used to be will not help us. We're not going to be going back to the way things used to be. It doesn’t help to have old people recalling the past and bleating on about the fact that young people won’t have the carefree world they inhabited in their long-ago youth. There was plenty wrong with that old world, much of which led us to the problems we have today.

We old people owe it to the young to support them in moving forward.

I’m not suggesting that we should forget all about PIGLEGS, and I don’t yet have an acronym for the new deadly sins. But I think we should keep them in mind: Complacency, Carelessness, Smugness, Selfishness, Cynicism, Disrespect, and Nostalgia.

Remember, and try to avoid them.

 

Ceremony

 

The word “ceremony” comes from the Latin word caermonia which refers to events involving “holiness, sacredness, awe.” Ancient cultures around the practised ceremonial rituals, sometimes bloody and more often joyous. These ceremonies were ways of paying attention to all aspects of human life: birth, death, coming of age. Indigenous ceremonies were often seen as means of connecting with the land, the life cycle and with each other. Such ceremonies emphasized reciprocity and interconnectedness.

In Western society, the word “ceremony” frequently refers to conventions of formality and politeness and is sometimes used disparagingly, as in “mere ceremony.” And yet our ceremonies are usually of great importance to us. We may complain about the effort that ceremony requires, but celebrations and ceremonies connected with such occasions as birth, weddings, funerals, graduation, awards and honours are important to us and help us to experience and express our feelings about such milestones.

The coronavirus has stripped us of many of our customary traditional ceremonies. Many hundreds of students have missed out on the usual graduation ceremonies, funerals are now kept to small numbers, and weddings are being postponed. No large gatherings and no hugs are permitted to mark these milestones. Church services have been restricted and choirs discontinued. We’ve had to forego many rituals we have about annual gatherings for birthdays and festivals. Like many others, I am feeling the loss of these ceremonies.

And yet, in other countries, people seem to have ceremonies in their daily life. They may create small shrines for their ancestors. They sometimes set a place at the dinner table for a dead family member. Many indigenous people bless the salmon and food they are about to eat. Saying grace before a meal, expressing gratitude for the sustenance that is about to be eaten, has been a common practice in many cultures. It's good to pay attention. Attention, Simone Weil said, is prayer.

As a result of COVID, we may have to work very hard to bring ceremony into our lives. But our they don’t have to always be formal; we can learn new ways of making ceremony and ritual part of our everyday life. Around the world and throughout history there have been ceremonial practices that have taken place in small yet intimate and meaningful ways.

Recently I watched the first Turtle Lodge’s first episode of the  Reconciling Ways of Knowing: Indigenous Knowledge and Science Forum (https://www.waysofknowingforum.ca/episode1) in which Dave Courchene, Elder and Leading Earth Man, spoke movingly about the importance of ritual. As he says. “Ceremony has always guided us.”

I feel in need of that guidance. A need for ceremony.

How can I create ceremony in my daily life? Well, I could begin each day with a yogic sun salutation. Or I could regularly walk a labyrinth as a mindful meditation. Or, more simply, I could make daily practice of just sitting on my patio each morning and saying aloud, as was written in Ecclesiastes, Truly the light is sweet and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun.

In these uncertain times, when we don’t know anything at all about what lies ahead, it makes sense for us to use ceremony as a way of feeling and expressing gratitude for each new day.

Emergency

 

Anyone who has read Emily St. John Mandel’s brilliant and terrifying dystopian novel, Station Eleven, will remember the early conversation in which an Emergency Room doctor is telling his friend about a patient who presented at the hospital with flu symptoms after arriving on an international flight. Within only a few hours, more than two hundred additional patients are admitted. He describes the ER being full, beds parked in hallways, half the ER staff too sick to work, and advises his friend to get out of town as fast as possible.

It’s a terrifying image of a situation which worsens as the story unfolds. It’s not the story I wanted to have in my head as I went to the Nanaimo Hospital earlier this week to deal with an episode of atrial fibrillation. Here, though, the Emergency entrance opened to a clean, well-lighted place with calm, professional staff firmly in control. As I entered, a friendly young attendant kindly noted that my daughter could not accompany me, asked me the usual Covid questions, and pointed to the hand sanitizer.

The waiting room was busy, but the admitting nurses were efficient and quickly moved patients through to the next stage. It was odd to see everyone wearing masks, and I could feel that many people were missing having their spouses or children with them while they were waiting to see what was in store. All of this, along with the endless sanitizing of equipment, might have made the atmosphere feel clinical and alarming, but that was not the case. The kindness, supportiveness and calm presence of doctors, nurses and support staff made everything peaceful. It was a busy night when I was there, and yet I felt well attended. Well cared for. I recall the King’s speech in Shakespeare’s Henry VIII in which he says Things done well, and with a care, exempt themselves from fear.

I left the hospital with my heart rate normal and steady—and nobody presented me with a bill for their services. If I lived a little south of here, my hospital experience would have been very different. I thought about this when I read Wade Davis's recent article in Rolling Stone: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/covid-19-end-of-american-era-wade-davis-1038206/

We are fortunate to have our good governments and solid health programs. No amount of pot banging and window hearts can begin to express our indebtedness to our professional healthcare workers and hospital staff for all that they do and how they conduct themselves in these challenging circumstances.

I am deeply grateful.

Wings of Possibility

The virus has offered me many new possibilities that I would otherwise not have known. Gifts, one might say. New thoughts. New practices.

I’m grateful for the endless free time I’ve had to reflect, read, write and, most of all, to sit out on my patio watching birds. I’ve always enjoyed images of birds and appreciated the very beautiful bird calendars that my friend Bill Pennell produces, but I am not at all knowledgeable.

I like Graeme Gibson’s The Bedside Book of Birds with its gorgeous illustrations and its whimsical and far-ranging writings about avian creatures. I was especially taken with the last section: Some Blessed Hope: Birds and the nostalgic human soul. Gibson quotes Thomas Hardy’s poem “The Darkling Thrush,” in which the poet wonders about the reasons for the aged thrush’s song and concludes that it is from Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew/ And I was unaware.

With much more time at home alone, I’ve taken to sitting outside.  Despite my lack of knowledge and poor vision, I’m trying to get to know the birds, to recognized the sight and sounds of them. I have a very long way to go, but some friends are attempting to educate me and have loaned me books.

There have been other virus gifts: time to organize some of my possessions, especially books, and send them off to the places where they seem to belong. Time to practice mindfulness.  Time to enjoy distanced visits with friends. More time than usual with my family, especially since they too are mostly homebound. Time to listen to younger people and get a different perspective on things.

The other day I was speaking to my granddaughter about some of the sorrow I feel about the virus. For example, I said, the sight of a young mother with two very little children all wearing masks made me sad.  My granddaughter said, “Oh, I don’t think that’s sad. People all over the world wear masks for protection at different times.”

I realize that I was reflecting nostalgically on my own carefree childhood, looking backwards and seeing the disappearance of the world I once knew. She looks forward and sees much more possibility. The world ahead appears different, depending upon the direction towards which you’re pointed. As an old person, I am bogged down with the past. I can’t imagine the future through the uncluttered view of a young person.

I can, though, learn to stay more focussed in the present. I will try to do that. Watching birds will be a start. And I’ll will read more bird books. Maybe I’ll get some binoculars.

I know it’s sentimental to see birds as symbols of hope and spirituality, but when I see a flock of little bushtits land on a nearby tree, or a towhee flashing its rufous colours and bright red eyes, or a red-headed house finch swooping past me, my heart leaps ups and I feel a sense of hope. Of possibility.

Wings of possibility, I say to myself.