Matt's Journal

The COVID-19 lockdown hasn’t been bad for me. It’s given me time to write, and to read. There are a few chances to do things in ways I already know, virtual ways: I’ve submitted articles for publication, and I’ve been asked to help out at the church with some technical things.

I certainly miss the small social contacts I used to get from daily life – coffee at a coffeeshop, reading the SCC papers. I miss reading and discussing people’s work in my writing class. I miss RTS. I miss swimming and working out. I miss eating out. I miss Mass on Sunday. Yes, that’s a lot. I miss being able to easily travel – to see Mom, or go someplace new. I would have liked going to Yosemite again with Ricardo…that didn’t happen.

It’s complex, life.

I’ve had blood in my urine since last Saturday evening after hiking with Will. It may have been caused by that or by biking down from Folsom the day before, or by both. I saw the doctor and was told to take it easy and keep an eye on it. It seems to be getting better, finally. I’m keeping notes.

I thought I could keep up with my 22 year old; I don’t FEEL 40 years older than him. Well.

This reminds me that life is short, that I exist on a complex structure that grew, like a plant, and will not last forever.

I might get a second article published – if so, that’s exciting to me. If not, fine. I write for me, primarily. It is still so. Montaigne wrote an essay “On Solitude” that jibes somewhat with what I think about it. He’s fun to read, for one thing because he writes so many anecdotes, usually things he picked up from reading Latin works.

I could write anecdotes too from trying to read the Spanish papers. For example, La Opinión A Caruña had an article about an art studio that created little yellow pennants that they stuck in the ground at parks, next to dog turds that hadn’t been picked up. The flags said “This isn’t a dog turd, it’s a turd of an owner” (“No es mierda de perro, ¡es mierda de dueño!”). All this during the coronavirus lockdown in Spain, which has suffered as much as anyone. There’s a bookseller in A Caruña who took to making doorstep book deliveries from his closed shop. People are creative when it’s a matter of survival.