Isolation, day 483
In this newsletter: Sunny Californ-i-a. Almost.
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Felicia and me, a decade-ish ago
Right about now, Felicia and Squish and I would have been waking up in San Luis Obispo, eager to meet a bright day, to have breakfast burritos at the Buzz, go for a hike along the beach in Avila, wander the boardwalk in Morro Bay. That was the plan: To celebrate our ten years of marriage with a little family road trip from Oregon to California, where we’d revisit our old haunts, show our daughter around, etc.
Instead, we’re on day 3,482 of never leaving the house.
But we’re doing all right. We’ve managed to stay safe, and most of the cabin fever and anxiety seems to have normalized. We’re all sliding into the self-improvement phase of our isolation: I’m working on the book again; Felicia’s working out, like, seven times per day; Squish is tearing through novels like moths through sweaters. There are game nights and movie nights. Felicia and I are all caught up on Killing Eve; I’m reading my forty-fourth book of 2020 right now (Abbadon’s Gate, the third book in James S.A. Corey’s Expanse series). I’ve started exercising more reliably. Squish is turning into an entrepreneur, peddling pencil portraits to her family for ten cents each.
Still: Californiaaa.
Felicia and I met there in 2007. She was making coffees at Starbucks; I was an art director at a nearby agency. When I finally gathered up the courage to ask her out, I learned she and her coworkers had a name for me: The grumpy hot chocolate guy. This was thirteen years ago. I definitely was grumpy; I liked chocolate; I was a guy. And yep, it was hot out, and I overheat easily. The label applied.
Our first date was a ballgame—the San Luis Obispo Blues, a collegiate team—and over the next few years, we crawled all over the central coast. We caught rodeos in small towns outside Paso Robles, or went jewelry-hunting in Cambria, or had breakfast in Santa Barbara, ate noodles and watched movies at the Palm in SLO... But our California days were numbered. In 2012, we pulled up stakes, stuffed Squish into a suitcase, and headed for Portland, Oregon. We haven’t been back to California together since. (Felicia’s made it back a few times to visit Stitches West, the annual fiber arts convention, but that’s about it.)
As of early February, the trip was still on, but we’d been indecisive about where to stay, whether to drive or fly. As COVID-19 cases were being reported more frequently in nearby states, we wondered if we should reconsider the trip. For a few days there, we still thought we could make it work. And then, overnight, everything changed. It’s hard to believe now we ever thought we could pull it off. Hard to believe there was a time in the last five months when we didn’t know the world was on the brink of something transformative and frightening.
So instead of cracking crab shells at Cracked Crab in Pismo, instead of tackling enormous burritos at Taco Temple, instead of watching Squish’s skin turn Pepto Bismol pink from the ambient glow of the Madonna Inn’s restaurant decor, we spent the day inside these four walls. (I’ve never actually counted the walls in our house; I know it’s more than four. Do you count both sides of a wall, or do they each count as the same wall?)
We’re fortunate in a lot of ways. Fortunate that, after I was laid off in January, a wonderful new job had already been knocking. Fortunate that, four years ago, we bought this house, a perfect spot for a period of isolation. Fortunate that our family members are healthy, that we’re enduring this in an era of FaceTime and Netflix and Ben Gibbard livestreams.
I remember an era in 2011 (I think—those years all blur together) when my team at work took on a new, demanding client. In our first week of working on that client’s projects, most of us clocked more than 80 hours; a few of us hit triple digits. We were at work together at two, three, five a.m. more often than was healthy. One by one we all started to crack. Someone would shove away from their desk, overturning a chair; someone else would storm outside for a smoke or twelve; someone else would retreat to another room to hammer away at the communal drum kit; there were eruptions and arguments, thrown keyboards and slammed doors. I remember noticing the trend early, and advising the rest of the team to be forgiving of one another; we were testing our limits, and it was inevitable we’d all shatter them at least once. Knowing it was happening didn’t make it any easier.
Here at home, on day 7,991, we’ve all had our little emotional collapses. No one’s thrown anything, but we’re all around each other constantly, with few places to retreat for actual solitude.
So there are little things each of us does every day to ensure that we’re taking care of ourselves and also not completely checking out of the important things. Felicia and Squish take long walks together. I never miss a day of keeping my journal. We read together, make art together. My mother-in-law keeps everyone fed. I loved weekend naps before; I consider them essential now. Squish composes her own spooky piano sonatas, and is constructing enormous golden palaces in Minecraft. Long baths are critical; some of us (no names, please) are permanently raisined. Long hours in our makeshift garage-gym cathartic, if you don’t mind the occasional spider or beefy millipede that’s squeezed through the garage door seal.
I’ve missed California since we moved here. It was the first place I ever lived where I felt like my life was mine, not another chapter of someone else’s outline for me. I’m nostalgic for it in ways I know it probably isn’t anymore, and maybe it’s better not to visit and realize that everything we loved about it has changed, because we’ve changed. This is the part where I wrap this up by saying I don’t regret anything, because I’m happy exactly where I am. And that’s true! Global crises notwithstanding, I’m very happy to be here with the people I love.
But goddammit, I just really, really wanted a Buzz burrito.
✏️Jg
P.S. By the way: Everyone’s pretending that things are back to normal. They aren’t. Be safe. Keep your families and loved ones safe. Stay home a little longer. Don’t let your guard down just yet. Please.
Felicia and me, a month or so before lockdown, and nearly ten years after we got married in a little wine bar garden in California. (She hasn’t aged a second, and I only get more scraggly, it seems.)
About the author
Jason Gurley is the author of Awake in the World, Eleanor, and other books. He lives and writes on a hill in Scappoose, Oregon. More at www.jasongurley.com or on Instagram.
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