One of my favorite picture books by Dr. Seuss talks about the how we “start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace
and grind on for miles cross weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place. The Waiting Place… ” and is a story I have find my mind drifting towards at various times over the last week or two.

So as life slows and we finish day six of being in this waiting place of social isolation, I am mindful of wanting to make this weirdish, wild space we’ve entered a constructive and hopeful one.

While the news surrounding the coronavirus alone makes this a challenging goal, Charles this week also received the news Monday that his sixteen and a half year tenure at the company we moved to Sacto for, will be coming to an end on March 31. The timing of this news came across as heartless and demonstrated minimal care from a company that he’s invested many, many hours into and we thought highly valued him as an employee. It also definitely made my intention of creating a constructive and hopeful space even more challenging. But yet I persist. Not because of who I am but because of who God is…. He first loved me and keeps hold of me and my family.

I struggle with a host of health issues that place me squarely in the “high risk” category for the coronavirus and given my past struggles with depression and anxiety, it would be easy to become fearful, anxious, to lose perspective, and to doubt the hope and faith I have in God. But yet daily I find myself choosing to turn towards God, His love and care for me, to embrace self-care, to reach out to others, to practice humor and finding hope, joy, and laughter, to feel all the feelings, and to keep moving. It’s NOT easy though.

Feelings of anxiety or fear can come on strong. Sometimes seemingly out of know where, and in the best of times, can be paralyzing and difficult to move through, despite our best intentions to live by faith or to live “our best lives.” Ironically, now at a time where it is very reasonable to be anxious about the unknown outcomes of this coronavirus threat coupled with Charles’ looming unemployment, I find myself feeling like I have spent the better part of my life preparing to deal with a situation like this one.

Not because I am some super hero immune to fear, or have profound wisdom but rather just a lot of experience wrestling and grappling with fear, depression, and anxiety to extents greater than I am usually willing to admit. Also, I tend to be a person who bears down and gets through the crisis then when it lifts, I fall apart. So I’ll share what helps me get through if a few of you promise to help me when I start to fall apart when the crisis ends.

When I decided to start blogging here about some of the things, I thought I’d be sharing more from a place of contentment and peace than I am right now. I am at peace, but the range of emotions I’m experiencing this week are much more varied and intense than they were when this whole coronavirus threat began.

For self-care today, I listened to a few of my favorite songs. I chatted a few friends. I ate a healthy lunch. I checked my blood sugars and tried to get my continuous glucose monitor to work again. I called my endocrinologist to ask a question. After sitting through a meeting listening to the same leadership team, who decided to lay Charles off abruptly (when he was expecting a raise and a bonus at the end of the month), talk about how everything we do as a company right now is about “empathy and integrity,” (when really it’s about making a profit), I made a few jokes with coworkers. But I also cried. Then I ran instead of yelling, though I forgot to take the dog with me. Then tonight I thought of the perfect response to the company talk. The quote from one of my favorite movies, the Princess Bride. I wish I had thought of it and would’ve had the balls to post it in chat window of the presentation, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

Tonight, I will end the evening how I have ended the last several with my family. We will watch an episode of one of our favorites – Flash or Supergirl, and then read and pray through a psalm. I am inclined to go back to one of my favorites, Psalm 27. I will leave you with the last two verses of it tonight, verses 13 and 14.

“I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. Wait for the LORD; be strong and let your heart take courage; yes, wait for the LORD.”