When I started a plague blog three months ago, I was aware that if nothing much happened, the blog might feel pointless. Writing online demands constant hits of drama, or at least brattiness, and I can’t be bothered being a brat. Too much work. 

Yet over the past three months, I’ve seen more than enough drama. One of our closest friends nearly died from COVID 19. He’s still recovering from the stroke it caused, and will be for a long time. Someone else I know survived a bad case that sent him to hospital. 

As far as that goes, I probably got the virus myself in late February before the doctors knew it had arrived in Toronto, picking up what was initially diagnosed as the flu. COVID, my doctor says now, as she tries to get me an antibody test. [Update, 2024: She did. It was COVID.] 

So, yeah, drama. Tension. Watching the death toll rise to 443,000 internationally. Watching Black man George Floyd murdered by cops in the U.S., while Indigenous folks Rodney Levi and Chantal Moore were shot and killed by the RCMP in New Brunswick. 

Watching helplessly, since I can’t march in protest. Even if I had COVID, the doctors have no idea whether your immunity lasts more than a few months, as it does with the common cold. With a high-risk husband, I can’t risk bringing the virus home.

All this drama—yet the fact is, my life has consisted of a long series of repetitiously quiet days. (Aside from the chain saw currently driving me crazy across the alley.) Since I got sick at the end of February, I’ve only left home to shop once a week, to go for daily walks, to have one distanced visit with my brother and his partner in their back yard, and to go to three medical appointments. 

Of course, I’ve got my work, my writing. I’m busy. On top of all the cooking and cleaning and laundry, on top of being the caregiver for a disabled person, I video link with friends, or if we feel Zoomed out, talk with them on the phone or on Skype. I read, I keep Netflix’s stock price high by watching too much TV. I’ve done meetings on Zoom as well, attended online readings and webinars, done some distanced mentoring with emerging screenwriters, and have signed up to do more. 

All this, and even though my husband is here too, I’ve started to feel…not quite lonely. The word that popped into my head this morning is unfed. 

Mainly I feel accompanied by questions. The obvious ones: When is this going to end? Are they going to find a vaccine? An effective treatment? If I do carry antibodies—if I do—will it make any practical difference to the way I live? 

Plus: Are all these marches going to change anything ? Or are the promises/sympathy/solidarity offered by the One Per Cent and white folks in general hollow? Performative? (I like that word, although not what it implies, and I think it’s pretty widespread.)

When this all ends, if it ends, will things return to the same-old, same-old? Or are we in for a cycle of viruses–and the ravages of climate change. Is the U.S. going to erupt in civil war? Did the Civil War ever really end?

You know how you ask a question, and there’s always a pause before somebody answers?

I think we’re living in that pause.