"a future where nothing pounces when you let your guard down." I felt it all, but felt that one, so, so much. Sometimes I imagine an island for all the people who live their lives standing sentry where we could just... sign a pact of no-pouncing. Sometimes I think the kindness of your comment forums is a little like that place.
I am personally offended by the live music thing and also I am deeply thinking of buying tickets to shows in a city where I do not live on the slim chance that I may end up living nearby but not buying tickets to shows in the city where I actually currently live because I know this city is a fucking plague pit.
In my reply to your wonderful piece about Sondheim, I mentioned that I had been writing an essay about what Griefbacon means to me in response to the special one year anniversary piece you wrote. I'm still not finished with it, but reading this piece which feels very much like your CDC guidance essay spurred me to at least share part of what I've written.
I discovered Griefbacon at 2am on Thursday May the 6th 2021. The date is burned into my memory because it was 12 days until my dissertation was due and at 1am I woke up in a cold panic, sweating and shaking in what I would later realise was a panic attack. Incidentally I broke out of my panicked state whilst scrolling twitter (now in reflection I know this wasn't the best coping mechanism, but it's what I did) and the first thing I saw was a retweet of a PJ Tobia tweet and a picture of a man in red, controlling a plough (my mind had completely blanked the fact that this was Landscape with the Fall of Icarus). I clicked on the link and almost immediately laughed because the first sentence about writing a long text to a friend asking if they were mad at you was something I had been experiencing. I was depressed whilst writing my dissertation and had spiralled into a pattern of self loathing, thinking that my childhood friends had just put up with me or were only friends with me because our parents had been friends and it would make things awkward to stop being friends (this wasn't just self loathing, there is a lot of truth to this) and that I was simply the annoying friend at uni that people put up with and would occasionally agree to meet up with but would never ask me if I wanted to meet with them or do something fun that they had planned. I laughed at the second line, I too had recently planned a large dinner for myself and got all the ingredients out, but decided to have a nap before I cooked dinner. I put my alarm on for 20 minutes at 3pm and woke up at 7:30am the next day with the food I had put out eaten by my roommates because they thought I was throwing away the food. Then the third line. Longing. This single word summed up how I had been feeling for over a year. Longing for change. Longing for stability. Longing for Summer. Longing for a return to Winter. Longing for the end of the pandemic. Longing for a normal that never existed. Longing for romance. Longing to meet the person again who I'd had my first kiss with in the middle of the dancefloor of my university's crappy student union on the night of my friends birthday, a week before the United Kingdom went into lockdown. Longing for understanding, and that call for longing was answered by your newsletter. I read that piece around 3 times over that night and then fell asleep. I think I've probably read your CDC guidelines over 20 times, comforting me when I've had moments of sadness or panic, helping me to sleep on a restless night.
Last week my brother was rushed into hospital with a chronic pain flare up, violent sickness and loss of consciousness. As I worried about him, taking phone calls about his status from my parents who waited in the hospital car park and found out information via text from my brother on the NHS ward when he regained consciousness, I calmed myself down by once again reading those heart warming CDC guidelines. In many ways they have been just as useful to me as the guidelines I have received from our actual governments.
"a future where nothing pounces when you let your guard down." I felt it all, but felt that one, so, so much. Sometimes I imagine an island for all the people who live their lives standing sentry where we could just... sign a pact of no-pouncing. Sometimes I think the kindness of your comment forums is a little like that place.
I am personally offended by the live music thing and also I am deeply thinking of buying tickets to shows in a city where I do not live on the slim chance that I may end up living nearby but not buying tickets to shows in the city where I actually currently live because I know this city is a fucking plague pit.
If being embarrassed about literally everything all the time is a symptom then I have had covid for approximately *checks notes* 27 years
In my reply to your wonderful piece about Sondheim, I mentioned that I had been writing an essay about what Griefbacon means to me in response to the special one year anniversary piece you wrote. I'm still not finished with it, but reading this piece which feels very much like your CDC guidance essay spurred me to at least share part of what I've written.
......................................................................................................................................................................................................
I discovered Griefbacon at 2am on Thursday May the 6th 2021. The date is burned into my memory because it was 12 days until my dissertation was due and at 1am I woke up in a cold panic, sweating and shaking in what I would later realise was a panic attack. Incidentally I broke out of my panicked state whilst scrolling twitter (now in reflection I know this wasn't the best coping mechanism, but it's what I did) and the first thing I saw was a retweet of a PJ Tobia tweet and a picture of a man in red, controlling a plough (my mind had completely blanked the fact that this was Landscape with the Fall of Icarus). I clicked on the link and almost immediately laughed because the first sentence about writing a long text to a friend asking if they were mad at you was something I had been experiencing. I was depressed whilst writing my dissertation and had spiralled into a pattern of self loathing, thinking that my childhood friends had just put up with me or were only friends with me because our parents had been friends and it would make things awkward to stop being friends (this wasn't just self loathing, there is a lot of truth to this) and that I was simply the annoying friend at uni that people put up with and would occasionally agree to meet up with but would never ask me if I wanted to meet with them or do something fun that they had planned. I laughed at the second line, I too had recently planned a large dinner for myself and got all the ingredients out, but decided to have a nap before I cooked dinner. I put my alarm on for 20 minutes at 3pm and woke up at 7:30am the next day with the food I had put out eaten by my roommates because they thought I was throwing away the food. Then the third line. Longing. This single word summed up how I had been feeling for over a year. Longing for change. Longing for stability. Longing for Summer. Longing for a return to Winter. Longing for the end of the pandemic. Longing for a normal that never existed. Longing for romance. Longing to meet the person again who I'd had my first kiss with in the middle of the dancefloor of my university's crappy student union on the night of my friends birthday, a week before the United Kingdom went into lockdown. Longing for understanding, and that call for longing was answered by your newsletter. I read that piece around 3 times over that night and then fell asleep. I think I've probably read your CDC guidelines over 20 times, comforting me when I've had moments of sadness or panic, helping me to sleep on a restless night.
......................................................................................................................................................................................................
Last week my brother was rushed into hospital with a chronic pain flare up, violent sickness and loss of consciousness. As I worried about him, taking phone calls about his status from my parents who waited in the hospital car park and found out information via text from my brother on the NHS ward when he regained consciousness, I calmed myself down by once again reading those heart warming CDC guidelines. In many ways they have been just as useful to me as the guidelines I have received from our actual governments.
You are so good. Merry Christmas.
Brilliant!