So 228 days of coping with isolation, terror diminishing to apprehension of Covid, apprehension building to terror about democracy, …

I stand in my entry way going over my armour – ok, glasses, sunglasses in case, scarf and hat for the other in case. I stare in the mirror. Oh yes, mask. It’s routine. Nothing happens except grocery shopping once a week. And recycling while I’m going down in the elevator and have to take the bundle buggy any way. There is so much recycling in the 15 storey building now that I have to hit the right day and hour or keep it til next week. Sometimes there is a parcel from Amazon, sometimes a Door Dash food delivery.

Then last week all hell broke loose.

So far as the family is concerned, I’m the eldest and centrally located. The latter is immaterial now since no one can flee to me and sleep in my solarium. There were video calls. The ones from across the sea had valiantly tried to wait but I am such a later sleeper. The ones from across the continent were more a slow burn. But, at least, the two took turns.

Our family gives us lots of opportunity to lose it. Past generations gave us a gene pool of psychosis, borderline personality, bi-polar disease, clinical depression, sociopathy, suicidality. Did I miss any?

In the course of my long life, I have had 5 therapists and 2 clinical psychologists. I have tried Christianity, Buddhism and Taoism, Transcendental Meditation, self hypnosis, hospitalization, journaling – I have 150 hard cover journals of 200 pages each, group therapy, primal therapy and a curious kind of mutual therapy, sort of damaged friend to damaged friend. My friend had a lot of money and all I learned was that the rich are more worried than the poor.

When someone calls in deep despair, I know what to do. Which is listen. Then listen and finally listen. It is also useful to inquire whether they are taking their meds. Across the ocean felt much better after taking the correct dose for the occasion.

Across the continent was a harder problem. Young person shooting himself in both feet, ending up with no income and no transport. Young person does not seek help because he is all powerful. If broke and possibly hungry. So we adults mull it over and over. We consult each other, even cross continent and ocean and conclude we have to leave him be. No more rescue ‘fish’. He needs to learn to ‘fish’.

I don’t mean to imply that I am beyond needing help myself. Depending on the problem, I can choose my sister, Georgia up the street or Julia, across the continent. Can’t breathe from acute anxiety, I usually choose Georgia in case she has to come down and apply a paper bag. Recently, a news item managed to pitch me deeply into PTSD. A family can’t have that many serious psychological problems without ‘breaking eggs’. Events from 40 years ago caught up with me, events I couldn’t stop then and have even less power over now. Twenty five years ago, we went to the police, but they were never able to substantiate our allegations. Recovered memories are shifty that way even when recovered by half a dozen members of the family subsequent to a funeral.

In Canada, we have almost 10,000 deaths from Covid with 1/3 the population of the U.S. which has about 220,000 deaths. We are glad to have Justin Trudeau leading a more or less effective national government and Doug Ford, our province. The number of cases is rising. Toronto and environs and Ottawa have closed bars and dine-in restaurants down again. It doesn’t materially change the way I have been living. Basically, a boring, long-haired life.

The U.S where most of my immediate family lives is either going to explode in two weeks or start repairing damage done. I can’t bear it, so I don’t watch anything but Netflix. I am reading Fareed Sakaria’s Ten Lessons from a Pandemic and intend to read Dan Rather’s What Unites Us. Please don’t assume I have not already read Bob Woodward, Mary Trump, Michael Cohen, John Dean, Brian Stelter, Michael Wolf, and John Bolton. But now I’m trying to read only more positive books. I also like a good mystery.

Why do I care? I’m Canadian. Why does the whole world care? And I have the kid who has no job or transport in L.A., the one I have to let be, as well as a willowy, red-haired 3-yr-old and her blonde little sister who is just getting words. And their dad and mom, both doctors in Texas.

And, as a child, I fought Hitler, scavenging metal and paper and meat fat for the war effort and praying for the Warsaw Jews. We won. So why is this starting up all over again?

Remember the line from Waiting for Godot: I can’t go on. I’ll go on.