Coming Out of Hibernation

As we come out of hibernation due to the lockdowns, is anyone else feeling overwhelmed by dealing with other people again? My patience is razor-thin when interacting with others in any capacity. Don’t get me wrong—being around, conversing with, and engaging with real-life people has been wonderful, but my patience is already fried.

Another area of anxiety arises while visiting stores, specifically the local Wawa (Wawa is a convenient store for those who live outside the Tri-State area). Wawa is always busy. Therefore, I have found it exhausting not to bump into potato chips while making a swim move around someone trying to reach for a protein bar, only to do the waltz in the middle of an aisle with a person committed to getting his sandwich. Especially when some people are wearing masks, others not, yet each eyeing the other in contempt, it is a social battlefield out here.

We all need a two-week training camp to learn again in every capacity how to be around others in a civilized way.

Mandatory lockdowns were needed to control the virus; like so many other truths the year of COVID-19 has illuminated, hibernation is not healthy for anyone. Secluding ourselves from others, both family and strangers, especially those we don’t get along with, can isolate us from reality. A reality that we are just as crooked as the crooked people we are now engaging with once again. What a blessing to see this once more.

The fact is, we are human beings, human beings built for relationships and connections—and not just the rosy ones, either. We are made to see ourselves in others and others in ourselves, which can cause empathy and fear. This allows us to be open to the full range of human emotions as we respond to life’s experiences (including navigating a parking spot in a crowded parking lot).

The road to holiness includes wholeness, which means seeing ourselves as we are, even what lurks in our shadows. Holiness and wholeness also require others. When we realize that we are part of a bigger picture, we do not disregard our or our neighbors’ limitations and shortcomings but, instead, include them, even embrace them. Thus, we find wholeness.

Even when we want to do nothing more than lay down the horn at the person in front of us on their phone at a traffic light that just turned green…seconds after we just put our phone down. 😉

Being out and about these days will take some getting used to again. That said, it is a beautiful reminder of who we are, our neighbors, and what we are called to do, namely love.

“The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”
-Thomas Merton