I had as close to a normal day today, as I can imagine.
I slept too late.
I cleaned the kitchen.
I rushed around trying to tidy the house enough that I would not feel terrible tomorrow (Monday).
We picked up E at the airport. (That part wasn’t “normal” but I can imagine that happening at other times of the year.)
I was/am filled/suffused/overwhelmed with gratitude and joy and amazement at seeing my children, together/close/kind to each other.
I sat down to do homework and immediately started doing other things that I am responsible for, like updating the synagogue’s website that conveniently excuses me from really digging into homework.
I finally started homework.
I felt the familiar, this-is-too-easy-so-I-must-be-missing-something feeling.
I realized six (6!) hours have gone by and I am not done.
I overthought it, did more reading, researched, wrote, re-wrote, edited and finally finished…one (1!?) f*#king assignment. (Yes, one. WTF?)
Only three more to go.
Then, then, I repeated the whole this-is-too-easy-so-I-must-be-missing-something routine with the second assignment.
(Seriously, I recognized what I had done and then proceeded to do it all over again.)
I got it done.
I took a deep breath and started feeling like this was a pretty normal day and opened a new tab in the browser.
News about the virus is in my “suggested reading” tabs. And I am right back in it, right back to where I was last night before going to bed.
I am scared and trembly and weepy and fighting the urge to go into my children’s rooms and hug them.
I wonder if this is what people who lived through war, like the Blitz when the terror of arbitrariness of whose house was bombed and whose house was spared settled into everyone’s psyche, or people in Iraq who lived with the sound of bombing in the distance that slowly creeped closer and closer: a constant tension juggled with a constant need to normalize, to be calm enough to get through the day, but then, in the moments when things are “normal”, immediately go to the worst feelings and fears, as if they are our comfort, our familiar companions. Because to not carry them around with you is almost more frightening.
Being afraid is not protective. It’s not. So why do I feel the pull of it?
I don’t know. I cannot believe I will ever really have a normal day again.