Day 32: Aftershock

"Good luck with the boredom," a friend wrote to me a few days ago. I'm not sure whether he misunderstood a statement I made about someone else or whether he was projecting how he was feeling. I have not had a moment of boredom since all this began. In truth, I don't remember being bored for years and years. Boredom is something that used to happen to me as a child. At least, I remember saying I was bored, although I'm not sure whether I understood what that meant. Initially, I couldn't be bored because I was trying to cope with many work issues (moving classes online, helping others to figure out how to run their courses online, planning emergency transfers of conferences to online formats), but also with the practicalities of being homebound. When I'm not working, I read or listen to audiobooks or watch films. The last two allow me to do something else at the same time, either knitting or drawing. Like many others, I have been cooking much more. Making bread and pasta from scratch (Tessa has been baking chocolate chip cookies, and we plan to attempt gourmet cupcakes this weekend). I have been writing much more (which is excellent). And re-started chain maille activities and Tessa has really taken to it. When I get tired of doing any of those things, I take time for self-reflection. I always do that, but I have been more focused lately, so I have been able to understand things about myself and others. Something I had been working on before but has become much clearer is how unscrupulous people were able to exploit my vulnerabilities to take advantage of me (sometimes for years). This worries me. I'm not concerned with myself, but with society as a whole. I wonder in which ways we will be exploited after this is over (and perhaps even as it is happening). Could we end up with collective PTSD? What happens to a large group of people when they all have PTSD? How will this make us more gullible, less determined to think for ourselves? Will we be even able to distinguish the real from the fake? Lately, we seemed to be failing collectively at that anyway. Are there going to be aftershocks of this pandemic? How will they manifest? I see fashion labels producing fabric masks, and I cannot help but wonder how much money they will make from this crisis. Because let's be honest, it is not as if they are selling those masks without a profit. It seems clear that the current lockdown will make most people poorer and some people, probably those who are already richer.

10:19 pm:

Canada cases 30,987

Deaths 1233

Recoveries 9757

World cases 2,158,033

World deaths 144,221

World recoveries 543,732