Never have so many plummeted, all at once, into existential dread. When I look back at this Equinox (8:50 PT tonight), I’ll be reminded of the millions caught in a pandemic – and all the lockdowns and financial craziness.
I’m having flashbacks – from literary memory – of what it was like for people huddling in the tunnels under London during the blitz, what it was like for those who lived during the flu pandemic of 1918.
Thanks to the internet, I’m visited daily by visions of such things happening to living people, now. For the moment, my nearest physical touch to it all is a palpable electromagnetic panic emanating from fellow shoppers looking at denuded shelves. May it stay that way, for me, for anybody I get within six feet of, and for healthcare workers who won’t have to tend to me. May all who are suffering find relief.
I’m astounded to see the coping mechanisms springing up around the web, from those fortunate enough to be fully resourced – though in some cases the comedy seems less than generous. For every cartoon, I have the sense of thousands of unemployed and otherwise deactivated people consumed with survival, or grief. Even a beautiful youtube of Spanish apartment residents playing music together, from their balconies, gave me a jolt: the song being played was the theme music from Titanic (“My Heart will Go On,” not “Nearer my God to Thee,” but associations of singing through a disaster were clear). An online newsletter featured a satiric piece about the explosion of conspiracy theories floating around the web, about which perpetrators launched the virus – hilarious except for the deadly consequences of what some of these theorists might do about it.
I’m profoundly grateful for all the meditative and contemplative techniques I’ve learned over the years for moving through difficult moments and using them for transformation. I’m profoundly grateful to be receiving, for free, so many new techniques and interactive opportunities through the internet. One teacher said we’d spent years practicing becoming the eye of our own hurricane, so we could be helpful in being a calm eye in the storms around us. I liked that very much, both as a support for going inward (and being self-reliant) while the world is going berserk, and as encouragement that my work in that area can be helpful to others.
I’ll end here where I began, with Kate Atkinson’s miraculous Life after Life (the novel with the blitz and the flu, and so much more that’s on the mystical side). I checked and there’s a Kindle edition – for those in seclusion, with no pressure on the staffs of libraries or sellers. Granted, only the fully resourced can access it – but those are the folks with the equipment and the time to have read this post. For others, I suppose I can keep radiating the calmest vibes I can when I have to go out somewhere, and get in touch with folks by phone and web.
What in the world will life look like when the Solstice comes in June? All the felt-sense measurements of Time are gone — only Sun and Earth keep their originally scheduled appointments.
Photo credit: Pixabay