Published October 11, 2023

Increasingly in the past 1,306 days, I’ve been thinking a lot about what’s happening and what’s not happening. About why so much of what I’ve been writing about is from long ago. About why I seem frozen in time, and not in the ways that make for good romance songs and movies.

This is not living. I am not living. I haven’t been for a long time.

Something a friend shared with me reminded me of that.

That doesn’t describe everything I’m feeling and thinking, everything packed into the dynamic that’s been happening, but it goes a long way toward saying so much of it.

I don’t have new stories to tell because I don’t have new stories. I’m not making new memories. I am revisiting old ones.

(Do you see that I still write in short paragraphs, the way I was taught when my newspaper career began? Long after my last byline in a newspaper, I think it’s become my way of saying I am done with a thought, even if I am not, hopping and skipping ahead as I try to catch up to my brain and its flights of fancy. And to make sure the next 10 thoughts don’t fly away before I get them down on the record.)

People have been encouraging me to get out more, but I am vulnerable to a lot of what’s out there. Not just the latest variants of what could cause me more suffering or end my life, but people who would like to eradicate me and people like me.

Also, when you have committed to precautions for more than 1,300 days, trying to stay alive or to keep your health from worsening, you don’t want to negate it by throwing caution to the wind. If I become careless and end up suffering or dying as a result, what were those 1,300-plus days for, then?

Rock. Me. Hard place.

Last night’s nightmares were some of the worst of my life, and there was nothing I could hide under to make them stop. Not my pillow, not my blankets, not my comforter, not a fort of platitudes and seemingly easy solutions. I am hemmed in, and in more ways than I am free to talk about publicly.

“You have to live your life” is a valid point, but it can be wildly naive about certain realities. In this, I don’t have the luxury of naivete. But I also know I’m running out of time.

No one should feel obligated to suggest solutions. Sometimes there’s no answer, no solution to the problem. You make the best of a situation if you can. A long time ago on a plane ride to an assignment, a co-worker was talking about enjoying life when and where you can.

“We’re all just whistling past the graveyard,” he said.

I think about that a lot.

I think about a lot of things a lot. I have a lot of time on my hands. Waiting. For what, I don’t know, but everything seems to be trending in the wrong direction.

I hope you are finding joy and satisfaction as much as you can.

Photo of woman with her head under a pillow by Mita Stock Images/via Shutterstock.