A couple weeks ago (or the other day, I’m not sure which since time all blends together now), I put a cup of sugar out for a neighbor who complained she couldn’t find any at the store. As I turned to go inside, I saw our mail carrier walking up the flight of stairs between the street and my house. We exchanged hellos. I was standing between her and the mailbox, so I offered to just take the mail from her so she wouldn’t have to walk all the way up to the box.
As she stretched out her gloved hand to pass me two envelopes, and as I awkwardly extended my arm to receive the mail, both of us straining to stay as far apart as possible, I realized my error. As she walked away, I’d broken the cardinal rule of isolation: unnecessary interaction with a human who does not live in my household.
I wish I could say I remained calm about this extremely minor transgression, but my first reaction was panic. The mail could be infected! The carrier could be infected! I immediately ran into the house and washed my hands. For hours, I replayed the interaction in my head. Had I put the carrier in an awkward position? Had I exposed both of us? How many interactions like this has she been forced into every day?
I thought about what I could’ve done instead. I could have said hello and darted into my house, but given how I was standing between the carrier and the mailbox, that would have seemed weird and rude. I could have asked the carrier to just drop the mail where she was and to back away slowly, as if she was a character in a shoot-’em-up action movie delivering the bounty to me, the mob boss villain, but that would be even more unhinged.
Now that very little happens in my daily life (a highlight of this week: seeing a one-legged crow), I found myself talking about this interaction with friends. “I accidentally interacted with my mail carrier,” I would say. And friends knew exactly what I meant. They would tell me about their accidental interactions, too; a person who got too close at the grocery store, or a neighbor who reflexively inches closer and closer during a conversation held 6 feet apart. It is natural to be close to one another, to interact, but now, maintaining space is a form of politeness, conscientiousness. It will take us awhile to learn these new rules of interaction.
As we’re adopting new ways of being, I’m heartened by all the efforts to care for each other even if we can’t be physically close. My neighbors left a note on our door offering to lend us their gas lawn mower, because they know we only have a push mower. A friend participated in a parade in which she and other teachers drove their cars through the neighborhood where their elementary school students live. Doctors are pinning photos of their smiling faces to their gowns to reduce the psychological distance from their patients and remind patients that underneath all that protective gear is a real person, there to care for them.
But I can’t help but wonder about the long-term toll of physical distancing. If just four weeks of isolation has bred enough paranoia in me that I felt anxious after a simple, low stakes interaction, what will another four weeks do? I can imagine a future me, relieved to be able to meet up with friends at a brewery again, reflexively hugging everyone as if we’d never been apart — but then feeling weird about it afterward. Or even worse, maybe future me will avoid those hugs and turn down friends’ offers to try sips of their beers, lest we swap the virus. Only time will tell, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned from this pandemic so far, we’ll get there when we get there.
Image: Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam. Wikimedia Commons.
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Every time I move to the other side of the street in my walks I feel like saying “It’s nothing personal!”. Watching things on current TV now I keep saying “they are too close!” – I wonder how long it will take to stop those well-learned reactions.
We were watching an old black and white movie the other day (thank you streaming services!) and cringed at every handshake, shoulder pat, or squeeze through a crowded train passage. Eventually I had to leave the room, it was so disturbing. Then I felt stupid for leaving the room about something as simple as watching a casual touch. And that led to thinking about the cumulative effect of societal taboo on the psyche. We collectively decide that something is bad and it produces a physical reaction. That led me to thinking about other things we, at least some of us anyway, now cringe at in old movies: racism & homophobia. I grew up in Texas where racism and homophobia were a way of life. You were taught to cringe, to reject, to judge. And I think about how long it has taken me to deprogram myself from that. How many gay friends (and family!) have waited patiently for me to get with the program and grow up into a new way of thinking. Why does taboo have such a strong, guiding effect on our behavior?