The platform at Warszawa Centralna on Friday evening, March 6, 2020. Photo by the author.
Like a skinny dog in a galactic suit we were ready for anything, except maybe for what was to come on the heels of our return. But first there would be sleeping on a train, seeing Prague in the flesh, reigniting the work that began in Vilnius last autumn. With hand sanitizer in our pockets, we weren’t exactly in a state of total complacency, but life seemed to be rolling along according to the regular rules.
Less than a single week later, unthinkable dominoes would fall. The closure of schools, restrictions on gastronomy, jobs gone overnight, basic services curtailed or outright unavailable. Now, in my country, we are nearing a presidential election that may or may not happen on schedule. If it does, it will arguably be a coup. Now queues—dash-dot-dash-dot—snake eerily along deserted streets. People are so vigilant as they refrain from touching anything that, impulsively, they wind up also avoiding deep breaths, eye contact, and conversation. (This makes me think of the way fingers naturally move together, until maybe they are one day painstakingly retrained to function independently, as they must if you wish to, say, play guitar.)
What is most missing is spontaneity, both in body and mind. I cannot run out on a whim or double back to grab an item I forgot. My thoughts resist following the paths assigned. Tethered to current events, attention retreats quickly, the same few tabs reloading all the time. Though home is where I often like to be more than anywhere else (in this way I am adapted to this challenge), I find that I am unadjusted to our family’s new anti-routine. Though seemingly there is time in abundance to fill at home, it fills itself—with agitation, worry, and bewilderment.
Perversely, now nobody can hop a flight, yet everyone seems mired in one collective-consciousness version of jet lag.
I look at pictures two weeks old—of a dog dressed to the nines, of people venturing out—and I am wide-eyed, humbled, and uneasy. I take slow breaths. I pull my mind away from breaking news and I remember that today the only way to venture out is to go inward.
A few of the participants of the Future Docs workshops in Prague about to jaywalk across Štěpánská in Praha’s Nové Město on 2020 03 07. Photo by the author.