Tanya Davis’s words in How to Be at Home pierced right through my heart, as much as they did when I heard her poem How to Be Alone back in 2014. Davis’s words with Andrea Dorfman’s animation were just what I needed to see and hear after eight months of mostly, well, just staying at home. A reminder, as my reserves start to dwindle, and as I wonder how much longer I can do this. Between Davis’s words and Ed Yong’s article, No One Is Listening to Us, in The Atlantic, I’ve been inspired to remember that staying at home is not passive, but an active choice. One of empathy and compassion, to support the many healthcare and essential workers who are risking so much more to keep us safe and healthy. That in our aloneness, we can learn so much. That stillness can be our teacher. That this is hard, but not permanant.
“If this disruption undoes you
if the absence of people unravels you
if touch was the tether that held you together
and now that it’s severed you’re fragile too
lean into loneliness and know you’re not alone in it
lean into loneliness like it is holding you
like it is a generous representative of a glaring truth
oh, we are connected
we forget this, yet we always knew.”
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