intimacy

Vaccinated after a year in lockdown, I don't know what I expected. More freedom? Relief from the stress of threat and loss? Release from tension or pressure? Worrying about myself, others, the world? 

Was it too much to ask for? Any of it? All of it? What now? 

Disappointed. Defeated. Deflated. 

my art - creation story: idea & insight

Lockdown was simpler and easier. Stay in. Isolate. 

Build a healthy bubble. In a controlled environment. 

Living alone made choices simple and easy. I only had myself to monitor and be accountable to. I set up my own standards of safety and happily focused on building a safe sanctuary. Just I, me, myself. 

The arrival of vaccines opened the world up once more. Offering lots of options and possibilities. Should I? Shouldn't I? Go for it? How safe was it? Which shot would I opt for? Will I have a choice? 

Crawling out of a cushy cocoon left me exposed and unprepared. Too much. Too loud. Too close. Too busy. Even vaccinated I felt very vulnerable. 

Where was all my confidence and certainty pre-COVID? What happened to all my social skills and conversation? Caught in unfamiliar undercurrents. Pulled in multiple dizzy directions. Context and coherence lost. Perspective and priorities scattered. 

Caught in this powerful undertow, I hyperventilate - shallow breathing and hyper sensitive. Confusion reigns supreme as safety shatters. Patience pressured to perform in relation to others that were absent and apart all year long. 

I love the joy and delight to be able to hug and kiss again. Share meals together and walks arm in arm. If only for this month, it was still the best birthday gift. Now off to all our different directions and destinations. 

We retreat back into our separate homes and havens. To collect the scattered self back into a solid saner me. Collect dismembered dreams. Reflect on this experience and recalibrate in peace and quiet once more. 

. . . .

It's been a year of being a grief doula to too many of my dear friends who have lost their loved ones. Young and old. Sudden or long suffering. Men die and women somehow forge on. 

What do I know about loss and grief? I knock on wood - all triggered and spastic - abjectly grateful I have yet to lose someone I cannot live without. 

I'm that person who abhors going to wakes. I stand stuck in the threshold like some scared squirrel. 

In the Philippines we film our funerals, as we do just about any occasion. It must be a huge holdover in our Oriental DNA. Centuries past dynasties of hired mourners. Or just our damn love of karaoke. 

We record our dead - all of it - death, dying, gone. How ghoulish is that? Morbid as all hell - that's for sure. 

Quiet moments with those in mourning are even more terrifying. I sit frozen, embracing myself. Afraid to utter any sound. Feeling too much. Naked. No weapons in my arsenal to comfort or condone. 

To open up and surrender to all the pain present. Fling open the barn doors of my being. 

Let love and light flow forth. In and out. Through our synchronized breath. 

In grief, if love were a door, surely compassion is the key. 

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