Quarantine Diary #12 3/25/2020

Right now it is 11:00AM.  Got up this morning at the regular time. Did regular things. Came to the office to write. Worked (hardly at all) on a project, wrapped an item for eBay. Announced to Len at 10:30 that I was sleepy and going to take a nap.

You know what he said?  He said, “Me, too.”

The following half hour he took the sofa and I took our bed and both of us slept like toddlers on cots.

This quarantine thing is something, isn’t it?  Sometimes (for those of us without demanding jobs or children) one just has to nap. I’m awake now and the fog is gone. The sun is out, and they are saying it might get up to 60 today.  I guess we’re as ready for that as we can get.

But do we take naps?  Or do naps take us?

…

Len and I have been together 40 years and 67 days. So far. Possibly the last 12 have been the weirdest. It’s just us rattling around our house. No company in. No going out.  People could get testy.

Makes me think there might be a lot of divorced people out there - the ones others are feeling sorry for right now - who are quietly doing happy dances in their  single-person homes. At least they don’t have to do this with The X.  Amirite?

Len and I are skilled at not being together when we are together. We often watch different movies, nearly always read different books, we tend to text and talk to different people. We seldom cook or do dishes together (one does one, the other does the other). He rides his bike, I walk. We have plenty of to-do projects for the house and yard but I can’t think of any we are going to tackle together. He vacuums, I dust and wash bathrooms. He takes care of the car; I do the laundry. He opens drawers and cupboards, I close them (sorry, married humor there).  

The survival skill from our years of working, raising kids, cooking, feeding, cleaning up – is that we are good at self-directed parallel work.

Who knew that being quarantined in one house with one partner would draw so heavily on stuff we learned decades ago? 

I’m really glad we are not newly in love. This could really mangle that.

…

I laughed pretty hard about this yesterday when I saw it on Michael Becker’s FB page.

There is a weird thing going on right now.

We are in a medical and political crisis.

Most of our leaders are extroverts – that’s the nature of leadership whether its good leadership or poor leadership. People who are not intimidated or overwhelmed by others are the ones more-or-less directing us about what to do.

But the ANSWERS about this –actual medical research and protocols - are brought to us by scientists who tend to be on the introvert end of personality. As well, the humans most nonplussed at living calm and productive lives during a quarantine – are also people who lean towards being introverts.

Is there is a deeper, wiser place to go with this interesting dichotomy of human types? 

What do you think?