Lessons from our Time of Social Distancing

We know theoretically that we could at any moment die from some weird accident, yet we have ways to blot out those thoughts. What we have learned, perhaps fleetingly, is that our social order is also tenuous. Our routines of work, church, hobbies, and vacations presume that they will continue as usual. But we find that they can and are interrupted. Everything can come to a standstill. Stores, restaurants, monthly book club gatherings can and are all stopped. Yes, they will return sometime, but the fact that all regular activity can cease is a bit of a revelation or a lesson. Our social order, like life, can end or change.

Second, we can change our modes of communication and communion with each other. Churches and synagogues find ways to work with their congregations via recordings, videos, and messaging. Teachers learn that they can deliver their classroom lectures through alternative means either at the assigned class hours or posted for viewing at any time. Even choirs can find ways to collaborate, but in separate houses. Whether like the knowledge that our social order is tenuous, this shifting modes of working together distantly will be fleeting, it is hard to know. But we may well surmise that there will be more “work from home” team, zoom, or slack meetings in our future.

And third, our busy world of working non-stop, planned play dates for kids, organized vacations and tours, is interrupted with more time for relaxation, television, reading, cooking, and resting. The thought that we’d have unplanned several weeks of “sabbatical” in our lives that turns into a staycation is novel. Rest and reflection are normal. Hibernation occurs for mammals. We can begrudge this interruption into our financial and work lives, but we can learn to accept a time of quiet in March of 2020.