Thank You for Being Brave

I normally strive for weekly blogs on this site. I normally make Monday evenings as my non-YOB, special “me” times, going out to a late-night coffee shop and treating myself to a cappuccino or cortado, then forcing myself to publicly pen at least 500 words here, whether I’m “feeling it” or not.

I normally do this.

But the last two weeks have not been normal.

I haven’t blogged in a while, and honestly I’m terrified to do it tonight. Terrified for so many reasons. Let’s start with the “stupidest” ones (perhaps a poor word choice but a guttural response that fits right now) and work our way up, shall we?

First, I’m writing this blog from home. And I never blog from home. Like ever.

I have no other choice. Nothing is open. No late-night coffee shops and no early-night coffee shops either, for that matter. Coronavirus has violently disrupted every facet of normalcy. Society’s. My own.

Normal Monday evenings aren’t normal Monday evenings anymore. And for God only knows how much longer.

Many years ago, I realized I thrive writing in public settings. Namely coffee shops. Writing at home was always a war for me. The silence, deafening. Music in the background, torturous.

If I wasn’t out, escaping the solitude, I only felt the isolation clenching around me.

Years later, I realized this is just my particular learning style, as we all have ours. Some work better in total silence, others with ambient or rock music, and others still surrounded by 17 conversations and clanking kitchen sounds amid sweet, sweet sips of joe. That last one is me.

And so with everything now closed, I feel utterly thrown off. Like Superman soldered with a necklace of kryptonite. A baseball player told to practice in a video game.

Writing at home this Monday night, getting my blog back on track — I groaned at the thought of attempting it. I fired up some hot chocolate to sip along the way, but I’m staggering line to line. This doesn’t feel right. Which leads to the larger struggle here.

Nothing feels right.

As a lover of travel and movement — somewhere, anywhere, let’s go — I feel crippled. Cities and states and entire countries are demanding their citizens stay home and not leave, and nobody knows for how long.

Two weeks? A month? A few months?

???

It was one thing when sporting events and concerts and TV shows were canceled. There was almost a novel element of appreciation that the big things were closing. A chance to tune out the noise and focus on the smaller, more important things.

But then the smaller things got canceled, too. Church, literal small groups. Groups of 50 or 10 or 3.

The big and small things alike canceled, the silence has grown more deafening. It’s clenching around me as I write tonight.

I want to scream, want to cry, want to pray unceasingly, want to never pray again, want to know where is the God I believe and follow, want to see the other side of this crisis, want people to be well again, want people to stop dying, want nothing to happen to my loved ones (when will I see them again??), want it all to be over already.

I want to go to a coffee shop on Monday night again and return to normalcy, blessed normalcy.

I live alone, and I’ve been watching a lot of Netflix lately. A lot of YouTube. Been listening to a lot of podcasts (you should check out this one). Been digesting so much content that I’m overflowing. My sponge is soaked, my circuits are fried.

I have digital therapy sessions. I follow CrossFit workouts from YouTube in my yard now. I brew coffee and go for walks in my neighborhood as another necessary outlet to pass the time, to do something, freaking anything.

I grab my mug out the door and see people walking around me, and I miss them — not them specifically, of course, but the concept, literal and metaphoric, of humans walking alongside me.

I text and call a few friends and family here and there, probably not as much as I should be doing, and it helps a little. A momentary passing of cold water over a burn.

But then the water shuts off, the silence returns, and the burn still burns.

I feel like an infection of zombies is spreading around the world, but the afflicted are ones who don’t have the virus. Ones who mindlessly limp and stagger neighborhood streets with literally no idea where they’re going or what they’ll even do when they return home.

I remember when this used to be fun. “Fun” in the sense that I felt up to the challenge of a few days, maybe a week or so of adjusting my schedule, writing from home, posting more on social media, and skipping a few social gatherings (I’m an introvert anyway; I can deal for a while), building my self-discipline and personal growth. I’m all about that growth.

But growth hurts. It burns. There’s no way around it.

With no official end date to this madness in sight, I feel lost in the torrent. I want to do everything and nothing, all at once. Writing and podcasting and oversleeping and binging. Replying to emails and letting them pile up because who cares, it’s the end of the world.

Digitally connecting with others and also ignoring all the texts and calls. Because what is there even to say?

My neighborhood walks often feel fragile and pointless, like I may break down on a street corner at any moment or walk some direction for seven hours and not realize where I am anymore.

I’m seeing streets I’ve never seen before. Noticing houses and porches and mailboxes that are quaint and beautiful. People walking their dogs and jogging, and they’re beautiful too.

I recently encountered some chalk art on the streets. It spanned a couple blocks, messages of promise and hope from some thoughtful citizens: take care of each other; love is everywhere; hang in there; you’ve got this!; we can get through this together!; we believe in you!; thank you for being brave.

I lingered at that last one:

Thank you for being brave.

I do not feel brave right now. I’ve succumbed to fear more than bravery in the last week. I fear even more fear in the next week or weeks or months or whatever is left to come.

And yet I consciously know the time for bravery is now. If ever there were a time to produce content that points to my Hope, the time is now; a time to pursue physical and mental and relational health, now; a time to love fiercely, now.

I see bravery in so many people around me (not around me, but you know). The chalk artists. Many of our government and spiritual leaders. Voices from the Internet in my earbuds and on my screens. How blessed we are to have digital interaction in this time of social distancing and quarantines.

Can you imagine coronavirus in 1920?

Gosh, I want to be like all these people. Openly admitting my fears and encouraging others to be brave. To take care of one another. To hang in there like I’m hanging, too. To believe more literally than ever in the God who heals and saves. To trust Him wherever this road leads.

Maybe normalcy is not the objective, the thing to return to.

Maybe whatever awaits us on the other side will not be normal again.

Maybe we can’t go back. Maybe there’s only forward.

Maybe this non-normalcy is what we’ve desperately needed for so long.