Isolation Walks Are The New Brunch

I’ve finished all my Christmas chocolates.
The rich dark brick from ChocoSol. The bar from SOMA with decadent cocoa nibs sprinkled across it. The Camino single origin. All gone. These are not bars for binging. They are artisanal, imagine a Lady Danbury eyebrow arch, to be savoured square by square. They’re the plus one to an afternoon coffee or tea.
My stash usually lasts until the Lunar New Year. It is the 13th of January. This very short year has had many mental health days. So so many.
We are living in extraordinary times. Alternately head-shaking, head-scratching and head-clutching-please-make-it-stop times. Every day is a twisted riddle and every day I tense at what the answer will reveal.

Democracy is in free fall. The pandemic rages on. Los Angeles is in crisis. Post exodus New York has been carved into tensely monitored zones. Paris has a curfew and a fine, and Toronto is back under a stay at home order. Variants are popping up in all the places I have lived.
We have been reduced to screens for all our distractions. Yes I still have books and music but anything that involves community has to happen on a screen. The only respite is to get outside.

Isolation walks are the new brunch. It is the only safe and sanctioned way to connect. Mask up, get the layers on and meet a friend in a large park. Stroll, with or without a hot beverage and a warm pastry. Get your steps in. Change your scenery. Repeat weekly. Save your sanity. One step at a time.

Side note: another bonus of walking is it stimulates creativity. It’s been a while, but I sat down for an 8 minute write post stroll.

“Ben stared fixedly into the flames.”
They weren’t supposed to have open fire pits within the city limits but the sirens were being summoned away from the park. Slowly, as the days had gotten longer, fewer people ventured through the encampment once the light went. The thought was it had returned to its outlaw state of the eighties. But it was different. There were rules now. There were families in some of those tents and shacks. Someone had volunteered to build a bunch of sturdier units when the weather got colder. Ben called them homeless hutches. They were slightly bigger than a good sized refrigerator box, made out of particle board with a hinged door that could be held fast with a padlock. Ben liked having a front door that required a key again.

prompt lifted from STATION ELEVEN by Emily St John Mandel