As summer approaches, my winter/spring distraction continues. As evidence, I wrote the first draft of this post over two months ago. Of course, it is odd that the COVID-19 pandemic has dictated that I stay home and work, when that is what I do most of the time anyway. I feel sympathy for those who are going stir crazy stuck in their homes, but I admit I am feeling none of that. I have stories to write, and I sit at my little table with my little computer and fill my extra hours tapping away on its keyboard oblivious, for a few hours at least, to the world.
My stories do not fill all my time. And the time they don’t fill is so tumultuous and upsetting. It disquiets me to watch the numbers steadily grow: infections, hospitalizations, critical cases, deaths. The restrictions on populations around the world, the unemployment, the economic pain are reaping a horrible toll. It’s hard not to pay attention, in the same way as a gruesome accident tugs at your eyes. Part of this pandemic, of course, seems quite accidental. People bear the blame for other parts, though. Some don’t follow instructions to practice social distancing or self isolation. Some assume they’ll come through it all just fine and don’t consider how those they in turn infect are going to come through it. Perhaps the worst are the few who could have led effective government responses, but were too vacuous or motivated by immediate political gain. They don’t seem to have the sense that there is a longer term problem. They have always gaslighted their way out of problems and assume that will be sufficient here too. It’s not. In democratic countries, such “leaders” can be voted out of office in disgrace. And those who don’t follow through on this weighty, consequential step will be failing us all.
With all this commotion, I admit I have to push hard to get past the distraction and lose myself in a story. But I have been able to push regularly enough to finish another novel and work on edits of a few more. The novel I’ve written isn’t about a pandemic, although a number of its characters die. I joked with a writing buddy that I should get a t-shirt that says, “I kill people. Wanna be next?” At least I am not dispassionate about it. After all, if there is no passion involved in losing characters, what were they doing in the story to begin with? Still, killing off characters at the same time that a pandemic is decimating the real world is sobering.
I wonder how many pandemic stories are being created at this very moment by writers in scores of countries around the world. Their stories will ring with an immediacy they would not have had last year. Even though my writing isn’t immediate like that, I hope I can touch readers.