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Sticking Together
Then the Lord God said, "It's not good that the human is alone."
Genesis 2:18a (CEB)
Genesis 2:18a (CEB)
It's a long and lonely road
When you know you walk alone
From "Remember Everything"
by Five Finger Death Punch
As I noted last month, my life has changed a lot in the midst of the current pandemic. The places I normally go are now closed; the things I normally do have been cancelled; and I'm spending a lot more time at home than I did previously. Of course, many people's lives have changed a lot more than mine. Like everyone else, I'm trying to carry on with my life as much as I possibly can. I've been working at home and not at the office; I've been writing at home as opposed to coffee shops; I've been streaming church services online on Sunday mornings instead of physically attending services; and I've been taking walks around my neighborhood and not at the places I used to walk.
The first Saturday of this month was a horrible day for me. I don't want to describe it in detail, so I'll just say that I was not alright that day. I guess the whole situation - ever increasing restrictions, relative isolation, and wondering if life will ever return to normal - had simply gotten to me.
As always in life, bad days come to an end, and good days come around once again.
The very next day, which happened to be Palm Sunday, a good friend of mine from church texted me while I was streaming the service. She told me that a couple from our small group would be getting married after the service, as they had planned, and that some members of our church were planning to congratulate them from the parking lot as they came out of the church. We all gathered in the church parking lot, keeping distance between ourselves, and we held a short wedding reception for the couple. One member of our group played a song on her phone, and the couple danced their first dance as husband and wife.
Seeing some of my church family that day really lifted my spirits. Though I had been watching services online, I had been feeling disconnected from my church.
After I went home, I called my father to check in on him, as was recovering from some health problems. Later that day, I had a surprise opportunity to speak with my grandmother. I had not seen her or spoken with her since the nursing home where she lives had stopped allowing visitors nearly a month earlier. Another resident of the nursing home, who has a cell phone, called my mother and handed the phone to my grandmother. My mother spoke with her and then let me speak with her. I was glad to hear that my grandmother was her same, sweet, forgetful self.
Since then, my life has had its ups and downs, but I have not sunk as low as I sank that Saturday. I think what's changed is that I have not felt quite as isolated as I felt then.
For the past few years, I've been part of a group of friends that meets weekly in a coffee shop downtown. We have, of course, had to stop meeting in person. Later that same week, we started meeting online through video conferencing. The next day, I reconnected with another group of friends using the same application. One week later, I had the opportunity to participate in a short prayer retreat through video conferencing. In the last couple of weeks, my church small group has started meeting online. Though we wish we could meet in person, as we did just a couple of months ago, I think it has been good for us just to see each other's faces.
Amid this pandemic, a lot of people have been using online video conferencing applications to stay connected with one another. Personally, I had not been very eager to embrace such technology. I had no objections to using such software; I just thought that meeting online is a poor substitute for meeting face-to-face. Though I still think that seeing people on a computer screen is no replacement for seeing people in person, I have come to realize that it is better than not seeing people at all.
I think that connecting with people through video conferencing has been good for my mental and emotional health during this time. As an introverted extravert - or whatever the hell I am - I may not be the most sociable person in the world, but I still need to be around other people. Walking around my neighborhood more regularly has been good for me as well. Because I'm spending more time at home, I'm spending more time on the couch, so I need to make sure that I'm getting some exercise. Walking also gives the opportunity to see other people and wave at them. I should also note that, though I'm usually somewhat ashamed that, at my age, I live with my mother, I'm currently grateful, because, if I lived by myself right now, I really would feel that I was alone in the world.
Because of the pandemic, we have to live in ways we were never meant to live. We were created for community; we were never meant to be isolated. It is in our nature as human beings to gather with other humans and to be close to other humans. Poet John Milton rightly observed that "loneliness is the first thing which God's eye named not good." In Genesis, we read that, after God creates the first human, God says, "It's not good that the human is alone." God then creates a second human so that the two can be companions.1
Though people have to be physically separated from one another during this pandemic, we must not allow ourselves to be isolated. Things like video conferencing might not be ideal, but they are better than nothing. We have to stick together by whatever means are available to us. Our well-being just might depend on it.
Notes:
- Genesis 2:4b-25 (CEB)
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