So, there you are all snuggled up in your pajamas enjoying the latest Netflix binge worthy show of debauchery. Huddled over a coffee table covered in Chinese food cartons and pizza boxes, you blink the sleep out of your eyes and see the sun has finally come up. You, like many other Americans are home for work, school and everything else as part of the national quarantine and state wide imposed stay at home advisories. Its seven in the morning and you have your first teleconference of the day in 2 hours.
Climbing into the shower is a more visceral experience these days. You pile yourself into the warm, flowing water of your shower and close your eyes. You think of all that’s happening in the world and how we came to be in the state we are in when you begin to realize you are going to make it through to the next phase of life after COVID-19, after this global quarantine, when life supposedly will return to normal. You read reports and watch CNN and listen to all of the future forecasts so you know things will never quite be the same and that the financial impact of the COVID-19 quarantine of 2020 will push online interactions and online business ahead a full 5 years according to your favorite financial news analyst. You wonder what stocks to buy, what you want to do first after quarantine. Its then, in the middle of soaping your luffa that you realize there is a massive issue looming on the horizon and will be brought about entirely by the lifting of the quarantine. Mental instability, PTSD and depression after such a massive event will be astronomical.
What can you do? What can we do? You quicken your pace prepping for the day. Out of the shower and its seven thirty. Coffee machine time. Cleanse the brewing pot by running- but wait, why after such an event will mental health decline? Pour the pot of water in the percolator and grab the coffee grinds out of the cupboard and fill the filter. Press the power button and now- this is bothering you. Its as if you are looking into the barrel of a loaded gun. You can see the bullet loaded in the chamber and are powerless against it. All that’s left to do is pull the trigger and out comes a varietal Pandora’s box of ism’s, disorders and afflictions of the mind.
Clothes on, coffee in your new favorite mug and its time for a little breakfast at 8:30. You sit down to your computer and slap it on. Your toast tastes exceptional today. The new package of Irish butter truly does taste- all those people. All of them, waiting alone to be seen. The pandemic going on now is nothing compared to the coming onslaught of cases. A familiar chime and its video conference time. Your guilt for what’s coming brushed aside. Just one more day this week. Keep it together once more and then you can fall apart after all weekend long.
