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Confinement, Connection, and Courage
A year ago today, I was in the hospital, recovering from a fall. It was a fall from many things; from grace, from old dreams, and from habits and thoughts that were holding me back. Injury that takes you down to the bed for weeks has a way of humbling you, of forcing you to reflect on what matters, why you think the way you do, and in my case, what it meant to realize I was living the life I’d always wanted, yet still tried to flee from it and return to a phase in my life that no longer existed.
As I contemplate the anniversary of that fall in the midst of a global pandemic, it’s clear that the past year has been one of confinement for me. At first, being unable to walk for 12 weeks, then recovering via physical therapy and exercise through the winter only to emerge at the end of February with a road trip across the Southwest, culminating with a night of dancing with hundreds of others in early March while a “plague ship” hovered ominously in the San Francisco Bay, only to now be in confinement once again. Yet this time, the rest of the world is confined along with me.
There are many levels to confinement and at first it’s quite isolating, especially when you didn’t choose it. Monks choose confinement. My introverted son finds relief in it. Yet for most of us, confinement that is thrust upon us is shocking, threatening, and lonely. The rest of the world…
