Featured Refresh
Text & Image
Many of us have experienced restrictions on movement and social contact during the pandemic. Talk about any restrictions that have especially affected you.
This is as much of the outside world that I've interacted with in person for the past 5 days since I've been stuck in quarantine in Thailand. Although I am able to call my friends and family all over the world with modern technology, it is still very different from in-person interactions and even small talk with random people at the grocery store could fulfill those needs for me, but unfortunately, I have not seen any real person in the past 5 days. Although food gets delivered to my room, the people delivering the food are instructed to not come in contact with the people in quarantine and thus knock to indicate that food has arrived, and then quickly leave the area outside my hotel door.
October 21, 2020
Text Only
Have you or people in your community been harassed, threatened, or attacked since the pandemic began, either in person or online? If so, what happened?
I have harassed maskless people I encounter, sometimes I lose my temper and verbally assault them. I have been sheltering in place for just about a year. I go out once a day for a walk, usually at midnight when the back streets have quieted down and I can avoid most people. Sometimes I feel like the ghost of COVID haunting the empty streets. Sometimes if it's a warm sunny day (I live in West Hollywood, in California), I will take my walk. I often see maskless, younger people. I try to disregard them but there are moments when a well of anger bursts up from deep inside and I yell at them. Sometimes I even wave my cane at them in a threatening way. I want to beat the shit out of them. Then I remember I am 69 years old and that I need to calm down and go back home or someone will beat the shit out of me. Where is all this anger coming from? Likely because I have so many comorbidities -Yikes, I hate that word- I have to stay inside all day and have everything delivered. Likely because two of my best friends have died of Covid, one in Miami, a Trumper, who on his deathbed insisted that there is no such disease and that Covid is a conspiracy between the lamestream press and the democrats. His name was M., an intimate lifelong friend I have known since I was a teenager. At home, the anger passes. I lift weights, I work on the book I am writing, watch Netflix and cook good food...waiting for the vaccine. - P., West Hollywood, California
March 27, 2021