Dear Corona, I Want My Old Life Back
“Hope begins in the dark. The stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”
It's been almost three days of me feeling like there's nothing to be excited about. What kept me going was the hope of traveling and surfing places I've never seen before. Now, with almost an 80% cut on my monthly income and no definite way to augment the income I lost, I feel like a caged animal.
I am a born optimist, but there are just days where I can't deny feeling hopeless and disillusioned. Maybe this is me finally accepting that my way of life has been disrupted, and nobody can give me an answer if life ever returns back to the way it was.
I miss the ease of traveling domestically. It used to be as easy as jumping in a car and driving to a destination a few hours away. Now, going to a different city feels like visiting a different country, even if you're on the same island.
Grocery shopping and going to the vegetable market is a favorite pastime of mine. Others see it as a chore that needs to be accomplished as quickly as possible. Still, I see it as a way to relax—like a kid in window-shopping in a candy shop and thinking about what I could buy next time I'm here. Today, it's totally different. It seems as if each decision to step out of your house is not something to take so lightly.
The risk of contaminating yourself or your loved ones is one of the biggest worries about heading outside. Gone are the days where I could head out to my favorite local cafe to work in peace if working at home feels distracting. I can't even strike up the usual friendly conversations with vendors or drivers on my usual grocery runs.
Meeting friends in my favorite beachside restaurant and bar is out of the question, and so is seeing people crowd it up on the lineup at my local surf spots. I know I'll regret saying that I miss the crowds once they are back, but it feels almost foreign to be surfing in a once-crowded place with barely half a dozen people out.
It used to be so easy deciding to visit a friend in another island in the Philippines. I was chatting with a good friend in Manila when we were talking about how we'd like to have each other try out some dishes we've been cooking. "I'll let you try this once you're here!" she says. I was about to reply, "Soon!" because that's what I usually would say until I've booked a ticket. Still, I replied with the sad reality that I don't know when I can fly again. I can't believe I don't know when I'll get to see you again. It sucks.
Some positive quaranthings
There are good things that have come out of this global health crisis. Personally, I've found ways to be more productive than I was pre-pandemic. I made sure to keep a flexible routine to keep me organized throughout the week. Daily exercise also kept me sane. It was to my ultimate surprise that I was able to build a habit of doing it every day.
More often than not, there would be a few consecutive days in a month that I'd feel down, and this is one of them. The past three weeks have been a blur of reignited passion towards my craft—writing. I've worked almost nonstop from redesigning my monthly newsletter, doing almost an overhaul of my website, and writing new content. I was excited to finally have the fuel and inspiration to move things that were delegated to my waiting list.
After a 20-hour workathon a couple of weekends ago, I saw that I achieved what I had always wanted: to keep my website updated by turning out fresh content. In a span of a weekend and a workday, I was able to create a workflow that would use all my unpublished and unfinished material. Now, I could finally be consistent and not get lost in the everyday detail that is consuming.
I would always think that I would need a team. That I would need to hire people, but I realized (which many of you probably do now) that there's so much one person can do, if you're patient and have a plan. Perhaps, I just grew up and was tired of waiting for people, but then again, I achieved a long-overdue milestone.
Now that I've accomplished that and now, just need to bide my time according to plan, I've let in some idle hours of contemplation, and it worries me. I wonder if all that I'm doing is worth it. Is working more hours than usual worth it? I need to make ends meet, and I'm wondering how to keep up the good work when you're creatively exhausted but even need to churn out something creative—is it really worth it?
If there's anything I've learned, is that as a creative, I need a sanity break more often if I'm doing great work. When I get pumped, I work nonstop until I've exhausted all there is to do, and there's none left but waiting on the results.
Waiting to travel again
I've been a regular subscriber of National Geographic newsletters since the global health crisis hit. They've been saying that travel planning is good for mental health. I didn't think about it two months ago. Still, now that it seems more and more of my travel plans are being scrapped, I'm slowly accepting that travel is postponed indefinitely.
Now I don't know when I can travel again. I'm trying to stay sane by still planning, but it feels pretentious. I'm not sure I can afford my initial travel plans, let alone the destinations I've been looking forward to visiting this year.
Vietnam. Bali. Colombia or Costa Rica in South America. These destinations would have occupied my calendar for the second and third quarter of 2020. The fourth quarter would have been devoted to my usual PSCT circuit if it pushes through, or I'd go on my annual surf trip for the end of the year.
There are just so many what-ifs and would-haves that I tend to not want to think about it. But I realized that the hope of being able to travel again is what keeps me going. It's what keeps me working harder and longer hours. Without it, I don't know what to look forward to. I've never realized traveling, whether for surf or not, is such a massive part of my life. I feel at a loss, knowing I won't be able to do it indefinitely.
One thing the virus can't take away
A surge of lukewarm seawater engulfs my body as I dive headfirst into shallow water. A refreshing sensation welcomes me whenever I take a dip in the beach outside my current dwelling place. Even for a brief moment, I feel thankful that I still have this to wash my anxiety. I look towards the open sea, slabs of blue-green water crash into foamy white water, a good sign of surf. If there's one thing that has been constant amid these changing times, I've been able to surf almost every day.
When almost half the world or even the country is banned from also enjoying an hour at the beach, I consider myself extremely blessed and never take a day for granted. It's maybe a totally different scenario for others, like my sister, who's been hunkered down in our urban home in Davao City. However, I realized, there are still things the virus can't take away from me: family, friendship, nature, and faith.
I feel incredibly privileged to have access to the ocean, a mere 100-meter walk, or even less to be able to handle the sand upon my toes. As we approach the tail-end of the surf season in this part of the country, I can't help but feel a looming sense of doom. I wonder how life would be when the waves are gone, albeit shortly. In three months, it'll be surf season again. It's not much of a long wait compared to others I know can't even visit the beach yet. I should count myself grateful, I tell this to myself every day.
Faith has reminded me to count my blessings. It's a surefire way to counter my bouts of sadness and hopelessness. I won't lie, I thought I was okay. I thought I wouldn't be that affected by losing the biggest paying client in my roster. I thought wrong. Like a soul in need of salvation, I took my pain to church (online) and cried my heart out. The release of emotion helped calm me down. Sometimes, there's really not much I can do but cry and pray it out.
After surfing out the blues, I thought about how I would end this narrative. In a quest for authenticity, I am afraid I couldn't finish this on a positive note. I don't have the answers to today's most asked question: when are things going back to normal? (whatever normal means for you).
What I do know is that I am grateful to be alive. I am thankful to still have my loved ones, and while I cannot bring back what was lost, perhaps the best way to move forward is to hold on to the hope that better days are coming. And that being better starts with me right now.
One day, we'll all get to take the masks off.
One day, we'll all be able to fly safely in the skies.
One day. It'll come soon. I am hopeful.