It’s still there. I should have unpacked it two weeks ago.
It was March 13th, yes Friday the 13th, when my husband and I met with our friends and decided the trip to Jamaica was off. The Canadian government had just issued a travel advisory amid the Covid 19 outbreak.
The four of us raised a glass to a good decision, noting we could come to our favorite restaurant every night as if we were away on vacation. That was then. Three days later Covid 19 would be declared a global pandemic.
This is now. We are self-isolating, social/physical distancing, monitoring the news and our health and filling our time in the most productive ways. I have never been so inspired to:
do my taxes (well actually Dave did them but I helped)
dust (he vacuumed)
re-organize closets
mark assignments
fill every sudoku and crossword book in the house. (I know we can do it online too. Just not the same)
cook (for those who know me, this could be considered rather major except Dave says I AM TOO a good cook. Bless him.)
Crossing all those things off my list gives me time to do this with no feelings of guilt….write!
A few years ago, just before production was halted on our YES-TV show Always Good News, Dave and I visited artist, environmentalist and my former art teacher, Robert Bateman at his home on Salt Spring Island. We were there to produce a series about this remarkable man, we had planned to air that coming fall. We interviewed him walking through his property, his beautiful art-deco home and…his studio, where the magic happened.
There were his well-used brushes, paints, half-finished canvases…it was like being invited into a sacred space. Dave, who is a pretty darn good amateur landscape artist himself and I, a sometimes portrait artist in training, were mesmerized!
How does he approach a painting in progress, what motivates him each day? what inspires him? Surprise, surprise: he told me he sees each painting in progress as his adversary. Each morning, he’d look into his studio and there is was, staring at him, goading him to get to work, to keep going.
This is how I now see that purple suitcase in the spare bedroom. Every day I tell myself, just unpack it, put it away but it sits there defying me. “Don’t do it….I will win in the end!” Somehow in my mind, that suitcase, I have come to see, is a symbol that life, even fun, MAYBE even travel with friends, will continue. As long as it’s there, I know I will need it again one day: its sundresses, sandals, bathing suits, flip flops and sunscreen waiting for better times. I have gone into it in search of various things I need day to day but I haven ‘t been able to put it away. It’s daring me to…
My practical self says, “All those things inside are getting crushed and what if the sunscreen (even though it is in zip lock bag, leaks??”. But the stand-off continues and maybe that’s a good thing. It’s telling me,” Don’t give up.”
I know we (hopefully we all) are now finally self reflecting, changing a lot of things in our lives, from the the way we interact with each other and our priorities in life to the way we treat the environment and focus our talents and resources but some things cannot change. These all have to do with the human spirit: the will to go on, the determination to overcome, to learn from each other, to question, to grow, to think, to fix, to express gratitude for the lesson this pandemic is teaching this poor old planet.
There is a book I treasure called the Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield that foretells of a great enlightenment. Maybe this is it? If we all stand together, metaphorically, that is, family, friends and strangers all over the world; if we all combine our skills, our wills, our compassion and our co-operation, life in a new era of enlightenment can resume. Our hopes and dreams will get back on track…and I’ll need that suitcase packed and ready….is yours ready?