Everything is Normal, Nothing is Normal

My dreams lately have been filled with missing things, about things that are just out of reach. I can’t find my car. I can’t find a store at the mall. I misplaced my dinner. I’m waiting in the salon chair and no one will cut my hair.

I wake feeling haunted, wipe the sleep from my eyes, and try not to think too deeply about what I just dreamt.

I don’t have to think deeply. I know what it means.

Everything is normal. Nothing is normal.

Each morning, I still find my way to the couch, even if it’s only for a few minutes. I read my devotional, then open my journal to make a list: Things we did today. I write the previous day’s date, then list whatever we did. The lists are all beginning to look the same, but still I feel compelled to write it down.

Mornings are for schoolwork and exercise; afternoons are for rest and walks outdoors. We don’t deviate much. This is the new normal. Every minute feels full because, other than my husband heading to work, we are together all the time.

The days are emotional minefields. I take one tentative step after another, trying to keep us all moving forward. One morning, everyone feels good. My husband and I drink coffee, read with the kids, get them settled into schoolwork. The next morning, we limp along. It’s one problem after another, everyone taking their turns throwing a fit. That includes me.

When the fits start, things speed up, then slow down. I troubleshoot what’s going on. I’m always troubleshooting. Even when life is normal, I run around taking everyone’s emotional temperature, checking to see if we’re all okay and where we can adjust. Lately, it leads to long conversations and lots of questions. I ask my kids how they’re feeling and listen to their answers: lonely, bored, confused, angry.

I don’t feel those things as much as a deep need to be alone. But I’m getting over it. Sort of.

I’d rather talk to my daughter about her frustrations than be alone. I’d rather work to repair the cracks with my husband. I’d rather dance and giggle with my son. I’ll give up quiet afternoons to walk with them in the park again. I’ll put aside all my books so we can watch Mythbusters or Parks & Rec.

I think about people who have no choice but to be alone. I have no choice but to be with my family.

There’s so much we can’t choose right now, and so much we can.

None of it makes sense. I keep taking it day by day.

I wonder, when all this is over, what normal will feel like. How different will everything be? How different will I be?

I start thinking about what life could look like after we get back to quote-unquote normal. But, of course, thinking about that is nearly impossible because we just don’t know yet. Still, I can look back and see where we’ve been, where things were working or not working, places I was stuck. Before all this, I was going to the gym nearly every day to pass the time. I worked my part-time job without much complaint. I wasn’t writing much and feeling guilty about it, but also displaced, directionless. I was lonely.

What I felt then, more than anything, was like a support system for my family, a one-way conduit that didn’t ever pour back in my direction. I was aimless and biding the days, hoping something would break the monotony and shake things loose.

Then, it did and here we are.

Now I wonder about what’s next. How do I want to go forward? Who do I want to be?

Even writing those words feels indulgent. I know people are unemployed, sick, struggling. I’ve been temporarily laid off from my part-time job, but we have enough in savings to cover it (I hope). My husband’s job puts him on the front line of exposure to the pandemic, but he still has work to do and income to bring in. The biggest change is having the kids home all day. By most accounts, things are relatively normal. Normal with a tick of strange, like an episode of the Twilight Zone.

Maybe that’s why I feel like I can ask myself what’s next and start to contemplate the future. We’re blessed. I know that.

But we know life will go forward. How, we might not know yet, but we will keep going. What matters is what we do with this time. Is this an opportunity? Is something shaking loose? As much as we might yearn for what used to be normal, normal will become something new.

It’s not the first time normal has changed, and it won’t be the last.

For now, I’ll keep taking it day by day and imagining what could be. I’ll keep talking to my kids and kissing my husband and throwing fits and feeling it out. We’re going somewhere, even if it’s still dark out there.

Last week, I started re-reading The Art of Slow Writing by Louis DeSalvo with a friend, which is turning out to be timely in more ways than one. Somewhere along the way, I started to expect writing to be quick and easy. When you see enough writers cranking out books in real time, it’s easy to think that’s the way writing should be. It’s easy to forget that writing is a process. That there’s a method to it, a rhythm.

It’s okay for it to be slow. It’s okay to have to work at it.

You can’t rush the process—the process of writing or the process of living. It’s all a process.

DeSalvo writes, “When our lives change, when the world changes, we must reinvent ourselves as writers.”

Yes. But, also, reinvent ourselves, period.

And that’s a process. All of this is a process—the normal, the not-so-normal, the tantrums, the grief. We all want to hit the fast-forward button and get on with things already. But we have no choice but to linger and let things unfold.

I’m learning to accept that.

What I know is, the same things that have always been true for me continue to be: slow down, pay attention, listen. Stay connected, stay present. Write everything down.

I know that’s easier said than done. It takes practice, again and again. It’s always been a practice, and it will always continue to be. And when we’re ready, when we find a tiny glimmer of hope, even for just a moment, we’ll try to imagine what might be next.