LIFE ON LOCK DOWN: DAY 41

I watched a movie tonight that reminded me that there are sometimes in life when sacrificing everything is the right thing to do. A reminder that there is such a thing as great love…something that I realize now that I have never experienced.

I loved my husband and I miss him now even 6 years since he died. But a great love, where you support each other no matter what, it was not. I believe there is such a thing as great love.  My parents showed me that it’s possible. However, I fear that I may never know it personally. I will be 54 years old at the end of next month and I think that my chance for great love has passed me by.

Thanks to this god-forsaken pandemic, meeting new people and dating has changed, and will continue to change, dramatically. Madrid is a city of 3.3 million people, but we scatter from each other on the sidewalk right now out of fear. I refuse to utilize online dating apps. I have already been badly burned by my first experience with them. Now, men seem only to want someone who is willing to break the isolation order in a drastic move to simply have sex. I realize that all of us who live alone have a need for physical contact, but meaningless sex with someone who may or may not have been infected with the COVID-19 virus is a chance that I’m not willing to take. I don’t want to die from a virus or have to spend an additional 14 days in isolation. Our initial isolation order was set to expire on April 26^th, but it’s likely it will be extended until at least May 10^th, if not longer.

Tonight the air is warm and with the window open, I can hear my neighbors talking. I hear couples talking and it makes me jealous that they have someone in their lives to share this isolation and life with. I feel a deep ache of sadness combined with loneliness when I hear their conversations and tears flow down my cheeks as I sit in my open window. I even wished upon the only star that I can see in the night sky tonight that my shit life would improve somehow. We have now been isolated at home for 6 weeks and the government has not announced any measures to decrease our isolation and go back out into the world.

Right now, my only instinct is survival. I think that private English classes as I have been doing for almost 3 years now is finished for the time being thanks to this current pandemic and that social distancing is something that will be with us, as well as working from home if possible, is the new normal. People who have never taught a foreign language tell me to teach online, but that’s only possible if the students are willing. What they don’t understand is that online teaching is good for more advance students, but those at lower levels are scared. I can understand that fear. Hearing someone speak a foreign language over the telephone or computer is different than in person because it’s more difficult to understand. I can attest that it was 2 ½ years before I made a telephone call in Spanish because of the difficulty.

Now, I spend my days obsessively on every available website applying for jobs, any job, that will allow me to at least cover my expenses. Moving within Europe for a job is not an impediment. I have applied for jobs all over Spain as well as other countries. But until the isolation orders around the world are lifted, who knows when companies will start hiring new employees.

It feels like I’m standing on the edge of an abyss, but for now I’m determined to continue fighting…fighting for survival.