Those last days in the office, we had a bet going between staff to see when covid would hit Colorado. I know it sounds crass now, but I think we were already coping before we even knew what was coming. I wrote my bet on the whiteboard, one month away.
“A month from now?” one of my coworkers said to me with raised eyebrows. Covid was in several states already bordering ours. He took the dry erase marker from my hand and picked the following Wednesday. Not even one full week away. He won the bet. Those were the last normal days.
Not long after, the executive director threw a hasty meeting on our calendars. He laid out the rules for what was to come. The office was going fully remote for the foreseeable future. We had one day to clear out our workstations. We could take home our monitors if we wanted, but we were financially responsible for any equipment that left the office. We had to respond to Slack messages within an hour, emails within 24 hours. We were not permitted to work anywhere but from home. We were not permitted to travel to any “hot spots” where covid cases were growing rapidly. If we did travel to a hot spot, we were not allowed to see any coworkers for two weeks. But most importantly, we weren’t going to let any work slide during these “unprecedented times.”
“We’re going to double down,” the executive director said. “This work can’t stop.”
That night, several of us stayed late at the office packing up our things. We ordered a pizza, drank the last of the old beer out of the fridge, and sat around the conference table making a new bet—when would we come back to the office? It was March 15th, 2020. Some people said two weeks, some said two months. No one could even imagine writing down two years.
***
In those first weeks, I asked the same question over and over again to everyone I talked to, “What’s the first thing you’re going to do when this is all over?” I wanted to remember moments I didn’t even know to be grateful for. It was a question that demonstrated how little I understood. It felt like all we had to do was just wait for someone to turn on the lights.
My answer to this question was always the same: I’ll go to my favorite coffee shop, order a mocha and a pistachio croissant, enjoy them inside, unmasked, and people watch. Maybe I’ll make eye contact with someone and we’ll let slow grins spread across our faces as if to say, “Weren’t those last six weeks stuck at home wild?”
***
I had a lot more park picnics that summer. I rode my bike a lot less because the trails were overly crowded. I checked the news more than I ever had in my whole life. I watched too many Instagram videos to try and forget about all of that news. I didn’t sleep much. I crawled through work. I cried every day at my cluttered desk, crammed into my too-small basement rental. I quit my job and moved to Washington, practically sight unseen. I tried to outrun the pandemic.
***
In April 2021, I received my first vaccine. The National Guard delivered doses at a casino 20 minutes away. I drove there slowly, perfectly following the speed limit, terrified I’d get pulled over and miss my appointment. In that first rush to get vaccinated, it felt like the tiniest mistake could ruin your chances of ever getting out of this pandemic.
I assumed the casino would be shut down for the vaccine clinic, but pop music blasted as I walked in. People played slot machines next to me while I waited in line. My personal pandemic was coming to an end to the tune of Turn Down For What.
What I remember most from that day though is the loneliness of it. I silently took the jab in the left arm, sat in the plastic chair for 15 minutes, spaced six feet away from everyone else while I waited for any adverse symptoms. I remember the white sticker on my chest that read 11:34 to let the camo-dressed man know when it was safe for me to leave. He barked the time and didn’t even glance at my sticker as I stood up and walked away. I remember driving home in total silence followed by an immediate return to my laptop to finish my day’s work.
***
A therapist once told me to get comfortable only seeing the path before me illuminated by a flashlight.
“You’ll see maybe 10 feet ahead,” she said. “And that’s how you move forward. Ten feet at a time.” She told me this well before the pandemic began, yet I still find myself regularly hoping someone is going to turn on the lights.
This week, 10 feet ahead looked like planting a garden in between spring downpours, discovering two patches of rhubarb sprouting up between some front yard bushes, a friend’s unintentional birthday bar crawl, a yoga class in which I finally laid my chest down in pigeon pose.
Ten feet collect into a thousand feet, collect into ten thousand feet until we are miles from where we began. Happy two year covid anniversary (covid-versary?). Just 10 more feet to go.