Day 8: inner conflict
As I expected, Jyn had to have her horrible neck abscess lanced, and I took her in today to have the drain removed. Cat healing is very odd, it's so hyper-fast that you can't leave a lanced infection to heal on its own, the likelihood is too high that it'll heal over before it's drained properly and lock the infection inside, so she has spent a few days with a horrible plastic bit protruding from her neck. This has, I have to say, discommoded her not one whit, she did that instantaneous bounce-back thing cats do when you treat an infection, and when I brought her home after the op she became almost immediately full of beans and hyper affectionate. I am still, however, torn between relief and guilt, I always feel as though I should have detected these things earlier, and spared her that trauma.
Trekking around in lockdown is bizarre. The city is not absolutely deserted, there are a few cars on the road (including, weirdly enough, a speed trap on Liesbeek this morning, wtf? really not an essential service, people, get back inside), and the grocery store yesterday was frankly a bit of a cautious, arms-length scrimmage. But the empty streets are doing very strange things to me. Too much of this new context is simply too ideal to me - it plugs right into the considerable bits of my psyche which are perpetually exhausted, drained and fretted by city living, crowds and traffic. Not leaving the house for the better part of a week is balm to my soul, and the current cityscape, grocery stores excepted, neatly embodies the way I wish things were, really. A part of me is, in defiance of attempts to lock it down and properly rub its nose in the real horror of the epidemic, trying to rejoice.
So, being at home is lovely and the city is very civilised when I have to venture out, and frequent faculty and university committee Zoom meetings are not rendering me too homicidal, mostly because I follow a simple principle of turning my camera and mic off and playing Ipad Stardew Valley on the desk in front of me by way of panacea to all the ivory tower denizens reeling and writhing and fainting in coils. But I am very tired. Partially because giant apocalyptic epidemic and crumbling academic year and stress, but partially also because of the considerable mental energy needed to impart a sense of proportion to the inner recluse who is, shamefully, lying back and enjoying this. This particular manifestion of the primitive dinosaur self should not be indulged.
This entry was originally posted at https://freckles-and-doubt.dreamwidth.org/976980.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
Trekking around in lockdown is bizarre. The city is not absolutely deserted, there are a few cars on the road (including, weirdly enough, a speed trap on Liesbeek this morning, wtf? really not an essential service, people, get back inside), and the grocery store yesterday was frankly a bit of a cautious, arms-length scrimmage. But the empty streets are doing very strange things to me. Too much of this new context is simply too ideal to me - it plugs right into the considerable bits of my psyche which are perpetually exhausted, drained and fretted by city living, crowds and traffic. Not leaving the house for the better part of a week is balm to my soul, and the current cityscape, grocery stores excepted, neatly embodies the way I wish things were, really. A part of me is, in defiance of attempts to lock it down and properly rub its nose in the real horror of the epidemic, trying to rejoice.
So, being at home is lovely and the city is very civilised when I have to venture out, and frequent faculty and university committee Zoom meetings are not rendering me too homicidal, mostly because I follow a simple principle of turning my camera and mic off and playing Ipad Stardew Valley on the desk in front of me by way of panacea to all the ivory tower denizens reeling and writhing and fainting in coils. But I am very tired. Partially because giant apocalyptic epidemic and crumbling academic year and stress, but partially also because of the considerable mental energy needed to impart a sense of proportion to the inner recluse who is, shamefully, lying back and enjoying this. This particular manifestion of the primitive dinosaur self should not be indulged.
This entry was originally posted at https://freckles-and-doubt.dreamwidth.org/976980.html. Please comment there using OpenID.