What Fassbinder film is it?
The one-armed man comes into the flower shop and says: "What flower expresses, 'Days go by, and they just keep going by endlessly, endlessly pulling you into the future. Days go by endlessly, endlessly pulling you into the future?'"
And the florist says: "White Lily."
- Laurie Anderson, "White Lily," from Home of the Brave
Someone I was talking to the other day said, by way of explaining his loss of focus, "...because it's Blursday." Even for me, as someone who is fortunate enough to have a regular work schedule, the days are blurring together. I might know it's Thursday because of the patients I see on that day, but somehow the Thursdays -- and Mondays and Saturdays, etc. -- are much harder to distinguish from each other than prior to quarantine.
Quarantine and social isolation are hard on us for at least the following reasons. First and foremost, we are social animals; being forced to be apart from each other reveals this to a degree impossible to appreciate when in each other's regular and free company. Even more introverted folks, when separated from their trusted others, suffer. Too, the loss of structure and routine, especially for those out of work, can be disorienting and thus emotionally burdensome.
What stands out for me, though, is the loss of novelty. Away from home, we have more we can do -- go to the gym, go out for dinner, go for a walk or a drive, go (somewhere else) to work. Yes, we can workout at home, cook for ourselves, walk around our yard or neighborhood, but even a large and ideally-equipped home can only replace so much of The World, no matter how small a piece of it we typically wander in.
Perhaps more importantly, I hadn't noticed before how much variations in my routine that arose just out of interacting with other humans, even strangers, adds to my sense of the passage of time and so to my sense of existence. One day I am able to get right up to the stoplight at Perring Parkway and Taylor Avenue on my commute; another day, I'm stuck behind someone playing with their phone when it turns green. One day, a suite mate's patients fill the lobby and I greet them as I navigate through, while another it's empty and I stay in my thoughts. One evening, my wife and I strike up a conversation with other folks waiting for a table at a restaurant, another we keep to ourselves. Even my two-block walk to the gym after work varies depending on who else is on the sidewalk and traffic on the busy street I have to cross.
My relationship with my wife and mom has deepened in this time we've shared together, appreciating each other more and more for what we contribute to each other and how precious we are to each other, but our day to day life changes very little and the domestic stage on which it is currently playing out almost not at all. We three wear our daily paths and deviate from them only slightly and rarely, simply because there are so few randomizing forces to influence our vectors. Impetus from ourselves to do something different can only be so effective because it comes from ourselves. We need outsiders to knock us off our trajectories and cause us to course-correct: without them, we have no markers by which to track the passing of time.
For now, our interactions with strangers must remain restricted to waving in gratitude through the door at delivery folks and hello to neighbors in our respective lots. I work to increase the novelty in my life by being creative where I can, trying out new things, home improvement, etc. Sometimes the best I can muster is finding whatever fits through the fiber optic cable. I remain very fortunate -- safe, secure, with an income, healthy -- and very aware of the plight of those much less blessed than me. My challenge is to stay well enough, mentally and physically, to be able to continue to care for my family in our time of collective isolation, so I fight Blursday with novelty.
Thursday, April 16, 2020
Wednesday, April 8, 2020
Days of the Virus: Creeping Malaise
Gotta stay awake
Gotta try and shake off
This creeping malaise.
If I don't stand my own ground
How can I find my way out of this maze?
- Pink Floyd, "Dogs" from the album Animals
Today I struggled more than previously to stay connected, to feel grounded in myself. It wasn't the whole day; sessions with patients went well, which always feels good. But by the time I closed out my last video chat, I felt drained, disconnected, and hungry for something unnamed.
Changing out of my work clothes and coming downstairs, I became more conscious of an absence that has been inching its way into my awareness, but still couldn't get my hands around. I plopped resignedly onto the couch. A copy of BMoreArt lay on the coffee table, a new subscription I've been excited about; I opened it to where I left off, but couldn't concentrate. I thought about a piece of music that I'd started working on recently, but my mind cringed at what seemed like a pointless expenditure of energy that I didn't have and that could only end in dissatisfaction. Same response to the thought of picking up Lynda Barry's comics workbook. Finally, lacking any better idea, I grabbed a bag of pretzels from the pantry, returned to the couch and turned on Netflix, picking up where I left off in the fifth season of Twilight Zone. Two episodes ("Uncle Simon" and "Probe 7, Over and Out") of Serling's sparkling, indulgent, thesaurus-busting dialog later, normally a tickle for me, I felt worse.
By this time, my wife had finished her workday and came to join me on the couch; she saw plainly that I wasn't myself and asked about it. We talked, unpacking the difficulty we had both been having over the last twenty-four days trying to sort out the best recipe for self-care -- how to recuperate-in-place, how best to use the limited energy we have when work is done, how to stay connected with each other.
Part of the balance I've been trying to strike is spending time with my wife versus making time for creativity. Being married to the woman of my dreams, my best friend, my partner in business as well as life, we seem never to run out of things to share, discuss, even debate; being with her is a delight and a repletion. When circumstances keep us separated for an extended time, we both feel the loss and the cost of reconnecting; our quarantine has felt like a boon in that regard. On the other hand, I have some of that "gotta dance" creative drive; I feel a need to make stuff, whether with sound, words, images, wood-and-screws, or what-have-you. If I don't do something with it, it kind of stagnates and spoils and that spoilage can give off a noisome fume that thickens my mind and mood like the blue cannabis smoke filling the car I first heard Animals in.
At the end of a day's navigating a sea of troubles, I often don't seem able take up my creative arms in opposition and instead settle into the comfort of the company of my wife. Not a bad thing, but if I do this frequently enough, the miasma from the putrefaction of my creativity starts to cloud my sense of self. This can feed back on itself, making it harder to push myself upstairs, into the studio and the uncertainty of invention and away from the comforting presence of my partner and the numbing reassurance of Netflix; a few loops of this and the haze thickens until a find myself drained, disconnected, and namelessly hungry as I did today.
But, this evening, my wife and I sat on the couch and chatted, holding hands, cuddling. After the sun went down and we discovered our lamps wouldn't turn on, we actually had fun figuring out why (there was a wall switch we'd never used). We lay together some more, her scrolling through her social media and me reading that article in BMoreArt I couldn't start earlier. We were present, just being, and it seemed what we both needed. After a while, I said, "I'm going to go write a bit" and came up to my studio and she picked up her current British character drama where she'd left off.
We both cope with the stress of quarantine differently, but we each recognize and respect our differences. It's easier for me to trust her way than my own, but when I remember, I can remind myself that it's okay and go do my thing. And when I do, that creeping malaise blows off me like someone opened a window.
Gotta try and shake off
This creeping malaise.
If I don't stand my own ground
How can I find my way out of this maze?
- Pink Floyd, "Dogs" from the album Animals
Today I struggled more than previously to stay connected, to feel grounded in myself. It wasn't the whole day; sessions with patients went well, which always feels good. But by the time I closed out my last video chat, I felt drained, disconnected, and hungry for something unnamed.
Changing out of my work clothes and coming downstairs, I became more conscious of an absence that has been inching its way into my awareness, but still couldn't get my hands around. I plopped resignedly onto the couch. A copy of BMoreArt lay on the coffee table, a new subscription I've been excited about; I opened it to where I left off, but couldn't concentrate. I thought about a piece of music that I'd started working on recently, but my mind cringed at what seemed like a pointless expenditure of energy that I didn't have and that could only end in dissatisfaction. Same response to the thought of picking up Lynda Barry's comics workbook. Finally, lacking any better idea, I grabbed a bag of pretzels from the pantry, returned to the couch and turned on Netflix, picking up where I left off in the fifth season of Twilight Zone. Two episodes ("Uncle Simon" and "Probe 7, Over and Out") of Serling's sparkling, indulgent, thesaurus-busting dialog later, normally a tickle for me, I felt worse.
By this time, my wife had finished her workday and came to join me on the couch; she saw plainly that I wasn't myself and asked about it. We talked, unpacking the difficulty we had both been having over the last twenty-four days trying to sort out the best recipe for self-care -- how to recuperate-in-place, how best to use the limited energy we have when work is done, how to stay connected with each other.
Part of the balance I've been trying to strike is spending time with my wife versus making time for creativity. Being married to the woman of my dreams, my best friend, my partner in business as well as life, we seem never to run out of things to share, discuss, even debate; being with her is a delight and a repletion. When circumstances keep us separated for an extended time, we both feel the loss and the cost of reconnecting; our quarantine has felt like a boon in that regard. On the other hand, I have some of that "gotta dance" creative drive; I feel a need to make stuff, whether with sound, words, images, wood-and-screws, or what-have-you. If I don't do something with it, it kind of stagnates and spoils and that spoilage can give off a noisome fume that thickens my mind and mood like the blue cannabis smoke filling the car I first heard Animals in.
At the end of a day's navigating a sea of troubles, I often don't seem able take up my creative arms in opposition and instead settle into the comfort of the company of my wife. Not a bad thing, but if I do this frequently enough, the miasma from the putrefaction of my creativity starts to cloud my sense of self. This can feed back on itself, making it harder to push myself upstairs, into the studio and the uncertainty of invention and away from the comforting presence of my partner and the numbing reassurance of Netflix; a few loops of this and the haze thickens until a find myself drained, disconnected, and namelessly hungry as I did today.
But, this evening, my wife and I sat on the couch and chatted, holding hands, cuddling. After the sun went down and we discovered our lamps wouldn't turn on, we actually had fun figuring out why (there was a wall switch we'd never used). We lay together some more, her scrolling through her social media and me reading that article in BMoreArt I couldn't start earlier. We were present, just being, and it seemed what we both needed. After a while, I said, "I'm going to go write a bit" and came up to my studio and she picked up her current British character drama where she'd left off.
We both cope with the stress of quarantine differently, but we each recognize and respect our differences. It's easier for me to trust her way than my own, but when I remember, I can remind myself that it's okay and go do my thing. And when I do, that creeping malaise blows off me like someone opened a window.
Thursday, April 2, 2020
Days of the Virus: Ceci ñ'est pas une ami
Like most of us who, in our social isolation/quarantine, are fortunate enough to have the household infrastructure to do so, I have been spending a lot more time on videochat than I normally would. Much of this is professional: my psychotherapy practice is now exclusively online, so I'm spending as much as six hours a day looking at the faces of my patients as they manifest on my computer screen. Talks with family and friends are also limited to phone or video; no in-person connections allowed, let alone hugs, yet, it's still better than nothing.
Patients, friends, and family alike have almost universally emphasized how much better videoconferences are than talking on the phone (one-on-one or in groups). I agree: the screen often quickly melts away in the same way it does in a movie theater and one becomes immersed in the interaction with the person. The mediating machinery disappears, leaving our perception filled with only the parts that represent the Other.
From time to time, though, this suspension of reality is interrupted. Sometimes it's due to glitchiness in the system; I've frequently been reminded of what "long distance" telephone calls were like when I was small, with the routine salutations of "Can you hear me okay? -- I can hear you fine" or talking about the quality of the connection with the same casualness one might take discussing the weather. Today, bandwidth and software issues in videochat have replaced copper wire and exchange switch problems from the days when Ma Bell was queen.
But technical challenges are not the only interruptions to the illusion. I've been increasingly aware of a kind of uncanny-valley-ness to videochat. I can, without prompt or warning, become profoundly aware that I am looking at a shimmering constellation of pixels carefully arranged to resemble my interlocutor, a two-dimensional simulacrum composed of 1s and 0s, teleported electronically into my monitor, my own personal Truman Show-reality that I am expected (and choose) to interact with. I can, for moments, feel profoundly self-conscious talking to a picture on a screen that, bizarrely, appears to respond to my responses to it. I feel hyperaware of the Magritte-ness of the proxy with which (with whom?) I am interacting: "This is not a friend" my heart tells me and I am afraid, fearful that I've been duped, that what I trusted to be real is a lie, and perhaps a malicious one.
Fortunately, I can also recognize the moments for what they are, paradoxes of perception, the irony of knowing that the image is false but also knowing that it represents something real. I ground myself in the trust that my friend or patient is real, sitting somewhere in their own bubble of isolation, the camera in their machine capturing and communicating their visage across cables of wonder to the magic mirror into which I gaze; it isn't actually them, but it's enough to reassure me that they are there and hopefully vice versa. After a few more moments, the illusion reseats itself and I can again interact as if the person were here with me and feel the intimacy we share, attenuated though it might be by the media through which it is exchanged.
I am grateful to live with others, sharing our isolation. Walking away from my computer and being able to kiss my wife, to hold my mother's hand, reassure me that they are real, that this is real, that I am real. It seems that it would be terribly easy to lose grasp of reality if I had no confidants but pixels.
Patients, friends, and family alike have almost universally emphasized how much better videoconferences are than talking on the phone (one-on-one or in groups). I agree: the screen often quickly melts away in the same way it does in a movie theater and one becomes immersed in the interaction with the person. The mediating machinery disappears, leaving our perception filled with only the parts that represent the Other.
From time to time, though, this suspension of reality is interrupted. Sometimes it's due to glitchiness in the system; I've frequently been reminded of what "long distance" telephone calls were like when I was small, with the routine salutations of "Can you hear me okay? -- I can hear you fine" or talking about the quality of the connection with the same casualness one might take discussing the weather. Today, bandwidth and software issues in videochat have replaced copper wire and exchange switch problems from the days when Ma Bell was queen.
But technical challenges are not the only interruptions to the illusion. I've been increasingly aware of a kind of uncanny-valley-ness to videochat. I can, without prompt or warning, become profoundly aware that I am looking at a shimmering constellation of pixels carefully arranged to resemble my interlocutor, a two-dimensional simulacrum composed of 1s and 0s, teleported electronically into my monitor, my own personal Truman Show-reality that I am expected (and choose) to interact with. I can, for moments, feel profoundly self-conscious talking to a picture on a screen that, bizarrely, appears to respond to my responses to it. I feel hyperaware of the Magritte-ness of the proxy with which (with whom?) I am interacting: "This is not a friend" my heart tells me and I am afraid, fearful that I've been duped, that what I trusted to be real is a lie, and perhaps a malicious one.
Fortunately, I can also recognize the moments for what they are, paradoxes of perception, the irony of knowing that the image is false but also knowing that it represents something real. I ground myself in the trust that my friend or patient is real, sitting somewhere in their own bubble of isolation, the camera in their machine capturing and communicating their visage across cables of wonder to the magic mirror into which I gaze; it isn't actually them, but it's enough to reassure me that they are there and hopefully vice versa. After a few more moments, the illusion reseats itself and I can again interact as if the person were here with me and feel the intimacy we share, attenuated though it might be by the media through which it is exchanged.
I am grateful to live with others, sharing our isolation. Walking away from my computer and being able to kiss my wife, to hold my mother's hand, reassure me that they are real, that this is real, that I am real. It seems that it would be terribly easy to lose grasp of reality if I had no confidants but pixels.
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