The last time I posted anything here, I had promised a lot. I was going to write up about our travels to Tahiti, my progress with an entrepreneurial course, and other life and travel related items. I was extremely busy in February preparing for our impending house construction, learning the ropes of my new job, and anticipating the launch of a new business venture.

As we all know, a certain virus had bigger plans for us all and my life–along with everyone else’s–took an abrupt change of path. I’m certainly not feeling singled out here. I was dealing with a lot pre-corona, and the stress levels were high for sure. But seeing how so many people in the world have lost their jobs, are starving because they can’t work to make money to eat, or are getting sick or dying from this virus, well, it diminishes the validity of any possible complaints I could have.

I have a job that I was already working from home twice a week for (and wanted to do more of that). While I just started it in early February, and it remains a challenge, I am getting a steady paycheck that is completely unaffected by the current economic situation. Our house renovation project is considered essential business, so we were luckily able to begin that while we moved to a very nice apartment only two blocks away. I am healthy and my immediate family members are safe.

Still, I would be remiss if I pretended that everything was fine. It took me a month to recognize that I was profoundly affected by all of this too. Aside from the fact that my travel planning business idea came to a screeching halt, the whole notion of travel has become once again a distant dream. The thing I most loved about life is now responsible for carrying an extremely contagious virus to nearly every single country and territory on this planet.

As I wrestle with this, I also see the unity of a world on lockdown. Cities are less polluted, people are being super creative, we are realizing what’s really important, the meme game is strong. We will get through this. It may be the first time we’ve experienced anything like this, but the world has seen this a time or two. I have hope that some things will change for the better.

I had hopes of writing something profound and concise that would sum up the state of my mind, but I think I’m still assessing what that latter even is. We’ve only gone through about a month of this, and it’s unclear really how much longer it will last. Some states are aiming to “reopen” on May 1st, but what does that mean? Is it premature to think we’ll be able to go out to bars, hop on a plane, or even go to a grocery store and find toilet paper?

I don’t even know how I will feel about going out and about. I’m still trying to figure out who I am going to be after this is over. What kind of reset button will I need to find within myself? What new ideas might yet come of this? I’d like to think that the universe has a message for me somewhere in this.

In the meantime, I’m trying to look at the news a bit less. I am meditating at least twice a day, but usually three times. I try to take short walks at least, although my 10,000 step per day norms have been replaced with 2,000 a day.

I’ve started watching uplifting things like Some Good News by John Krasinski and anything creative and fun that families are doing to keep their sanity while being at home with their kids. Oh, and yes, I have also watched Tiger King. There is still so much potential that I hope to untap, beyond TV and the Internet.

And now I am going to go out for a walk, listen to a podcast, and dodge people on the sidewalks as I navigate the neighborhood paths. Someday we’ll look back and remember this weird time as an incredible piece of history.