Virginia Capitol Connections Spring 2020

Mornings are very different now By Bonnie Atwood

In some ways, I like that. I can do things in the order that I choose. But then…I find myself paralyzed. What order? I don’t really want to do anything at all. Nothing is interesting anymore. Even reading, the mainstay of my life. I read the first lines over and over. I can’t focus. That was the realization that prompted me to call my family doctor. The full-time worry and fear. The constant thoughts of the sick and dying, the caregivers, the departed being deprived of the family funeral. That did it. I called my doctor and we had a teleconference. This was a trip up the learning curve for me, but it worked. He helped me to put this nightmare into perspective. I was having flashbacks of the worst moments of recent history: the Cuban missile crisis, the assassinations, Three-Mile Island, Love Canal, Chernobyl, the Peruvians trapped underground. With his help, I was able to stop the spiraling of despair. It takes a while for this to sink in. The last public gathering that I attended was a meeting of volunteer firefighters that David Bailey and I lobby for. “Are you sure you want to go?” asked David. “Because if you feel hesitant, you don’t have to go.” “Of course, I want to go!” I said confidently. I enjoy these meetings. These men do important work, and the church women serve a wonderful homecooked meal. I use the hand sanitizer. What was the problem? Within 24 hours, the magnitude of this pandemic hit me. There would be nomoremeetings, nomore parties, nomore lunch out, nomore museum visits. And no more school! No more political committees! No more personal visits to legislators! No more church services! The emotions hit

Mornings are very different now. As the sun peeks through my bedroom curtains, my first thought is “We’re in a pandemic.” I ask myself if it is real. It is. Then I talk to my deceased mother about it. “Mom, you’re never going to believe this: we’re in a pandemic.” I imagine the shocked look on her face. It is assumed that her generation talked more about the depression than the epidemic, but that been proven not to be the case.

She was eight years old when the Spanish flu epidemic hit the United States. Our family lost a lot of members, especially from my father’s side. I am told that when the epidemic ended, they had a family portrait taken, to memorialize those who were left. The lingering feeling was that you just never know. Maybe that’s why it was a taboo subject in our family. Will it be that way for our great grandchildren? I tell her more about it—more as a reminder to myself—as a reality check. Yes. This is true. I won’t be going out. I go out once a week for food and I wear a mask. I don’t go downtown to the sunny office from where we watch theVirginia Capitol and talk about all the comings and goings over there. I don’t stand at the visitors’ entrance to stalk a legislator to whom I desperately need to talk. That is the essence of what lobbyists do. Or did. We don’t know how things will work now. I get up and read the Richmond Times-Dispatch . I remember when all kinds of subjects led the front page. Now it’s the virus. The virus. The virus. When Kobe Bryant was killed, there was a big story about him, with a small story about the virus. No more. The virus leads. I want to read about some hot bills at the General Assembly. I find them on my computer, but rarely in the newspaper. My computer is, in many ways, my new world. I stopped watching the President’s press conferences. The interactions with the press were too disturbing. I always watch the Governor’s press conference. The numbers scare me, but Gov. Northam’s voice is calming. I “plan” my day. Plan is in quotes because the main quality of the plan is that there is no plan. Oh, sure there are things to do. My job, especially. Coffee, planning family meals (spaghetti again, because that’s all we have), paying bills (or at least looking at them and worrying), remembering that Crunch gym, were I get in free as a senior citizen, is closed and my body is feeling weak. Routines. But the dictated structure is gone.

hard. Anxiety, depression, and, yes, an occasional laugh. We don’t know how or when this will end. I don’t know if I or my family will get sick. All I know, is that I look forward to the day when I wake in the morning and say, “Mom, the pandemic is over.” Bonnie Atwood is editor of Virginia Capitol Connections Quarterly Magazine .

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