Well, it has been a while since writing here. I don't really have an 'excuse'. So many things are happening in the world, in my community, and in my life, but at the same time, everything is on hold (again). I have stocked up supplies for two weeks, I won't go inside places if I don't need to, I'm absolutely using sanitizer all the time, and, of course, my wearing of masks in public is an always thing. Sigh.
I am thinking a lot about two main ideas that I want to write about here. I think I have always known these things, but COVID life has certainly illuminated these needs for me in some special ways.
LOVE is very important, maybe even the KEY, to getting through this virus intact. You know I am not talking about romantic love, or even 'unconditional love' or 'best friend' love. No, the kind of love I am talking about is just general love of other living things. Practicing this kind of love makes you automatically respectful of other people, automatically polite, automatically KIND. I think that the word for this type of love may be agape, and although I am not fond of the religious connotations in the common usage of that word, that is the closest term I can find for what I am talking about. Love with charity. Love just because. Love that is not earned, it just IS. Some people, like the woman I work with named April, shows that type of love just naturally, but I think that most of us have to work very hard to practice it. And the practice of LOVE is SO MISSING in the mask arguments, the political arguments, the show of guns, the destruction of common norms of social behavior (like no name-calling, no hurtful lying, no stealing, etc). It would be wonderful if we all would just take a step back and remember LOVE, first. I bet figuring out what to do about our issues would fall into place a whole lot easier.
The second idea might not seem so lofty, and some think that it is 'just' entertainment, but music is a cooperative team sport, in my mind. And in a world where we have to necessarily isolate much of the time, it is difficult to make music as it should be made.... by musicians, playing to an audience, live. At the very least, there are two on the team... the artist and the audience. Yes, I know, much, if not most, music is created and made by lone people playing into a recording device. But the MUSIC is not really whole if there is no one to hear it, enjoy it, feel it besides the maker. And, it usually sounds better, is more interesting, and speaks more to the heart, when there are several musicians all working together on the sound of the song. Although, yes, sometimes we record separately, there is NOTHING like the feel of being in the same physical space with another musician you work with and coming up with SOUNDS that make your brain and body soar! COVID has basically made doing that a risk to your very life. And then... to make that music live in front of other people!!! And ALL of you are listening and moving to those same sounds.... THAT is something so very basic to life that I am at a loss of how to describe it any better. I just know that for many of us, music is an ultimately social thing that is also SO MISSING in the world right now.
I am sure that people reading this have other important ideas that they are learning about... maybe things like family time or the importance of taking care of your mind and body. Yep, whatever makes your world, work it. I think most will agree that we absolutely DO need each other. But we also have to continue to be safe, for the love of each other.
Which brings to mind one of the memes I have recently seen that really puts it together....
We isolate now so that when we gather again, no one is missing.
Wow.
Yes.
Be safe folks!
