Social Distancing Diaries: April 19

Before we begin, I don’t really have the words to say anything about the tragedy that just happened in Nova Scotia other than that it was awful.

I’m switching my weekend posts to Sundays, so if you regularly check the blog for updates, update your expectations accordingly. I’m hoping to get posting on the other blog on Thursdays and Saturdays, so it’s probably a good time to alter the schedule, though the real reason I didn’t post yesterday was far less intentional.

I wasn’t feeling particularly great on Friday night; just scattered and off, not really wanting to do much of anything. It may have been because it’s been a month since the lockdown began but it feels much longer, and the repetitive nature of quarantine is starting to get to me. It could also have been impotent rage towards the people who decided their freedom to go to the beach or gather in a crowd is more valuable than the lives of thousands of people. Maybe I just felt disconnected from people, or at least that I felt like I had to hide away from them. I could have just been feeling disregulated. I decided I needed to just have the Saturday to myself; draw a bath, order food in, do things that make me feel good.

I’ve been having a lot of bizarre and vivid dreams; a lot of them seem to conflate distinct time periods in my life. One dream had me having to move to the middle of nowhere with my family (and deeply resenting it) and start anew at a new school (whose population was mostly people from junior high and high school in Winnipeg, though I think there were a handful of former co-workers in there), and for some reason an entourage of people from Miramichi and Mount Allison in formal wear sought me out at my home and took me there in a limo. Another dream had my family living in a nice apartment and my sisters got evicted from their bedroom while they were on vacation. There was also a dream where for some reason a dentist’s office was giving out estradiol and spironolactone (testosterone blocker) to patients; for some reason a training class led by a previous work supervisor was happening on the same floor, and I had to squeeze out some stairwell that was blocked off.

It amazes me how often my dreams involve me living at home, or being forced to relocate with my family; I love them, but I don’t want to leave Halifax, my job, or live with them. I can see why I sometimes see different people I know in my dreams, even if the details are off (in one, a redheaded woman friend was completely bald for some reason), but the number of dreams I have where I’m always with family or in places where I lived in the past is a little disappointing. Why can’t my imagination come up with something different?

I have a bunch of e-mails I still owe people and a few other blog posts I’m working on in another queue. I really want to veg out on the couch for the next week and watch movies or old TV shows, but I can’t decide what I’m in the mood for. I’m thinking about people I miss and what I want to tell them.

It’s been a weird day.