Oh well. When I get my 2nd jab (Moderna), I will get out while observing CDC-guidance.
But this pandemic brought back memories of past lonely times, like the time I was “parachuted” into lily-white Penn State, freshly arrived from South Vietnam.
Missed Move-in date, missed Fall orientation, I started from ground zero literally all-by-myself.
In the rented dark basement (with side-door entrance).
Yet I managed to bring over a bunch of fellow students like myself, for a Christmas get-together.
Dim the light (not much lighting to begin with) and put on the music (cassette tapes).
Gotta to celebrate, first Christmas away from home. White Christmas, like the coded song from the Armed Forces Radio that signaled the US withdrawal and evacuation.
Isolation is not healthy for the brain and body.
Loneliness is a feeling, but it is nevertheless real.
” I am Mr Lonely, …I’ve got nobody….”
Broken. Unmendable.
Hole larger than the body’s ability to heal and fill it. “Cry, my beloved country”…like a book title.
This gap looms large, spanning decades….in the genes…before I was born: 1954 partition of North and South, then my own 1975 hasty departure.
Car, barge, battle ship, plane, bus, car..then trekking through the snow, to class, to work..(my daughter now needs vaccinations before she could follow in my trail).
Penn State.
In the Fall of 75.
Here comes the Sun…it’s alright.
But before the Sun, all I’ve got was “Feelings, nothing more than feelings, trying to forget mine….feelings like a flood”.
Perhaps I tortured myself…(self-recrimination)….for leaving behind both of my parents (father stayed behind, mother in the refugee camp).
Perhaps I tortured myself for facing a future with inadequate resources (two sets of clothes and a Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, a birthday gift from co-workers at Indiantown Gap’s Bureau of Child Welfare).
Perhaps I tortured myself for squandering my war-year opportunities, for going to the dance instead of solving math equations….or recently, for fawning….(viewing myself through the “white” lens).
Whether it’s true or not, I found myself the only one to blame.
The enormity of culture shock, albeit with vast opportunities on the other side. But first, the compartmentalization (of feelings, of what is personal and what is public, of memory and reality)…
Lonely, Mr Lonely….I’ve got nobody….
By the time this pandemic hit, I have developed a reserve of immunity against social isolation.
To withstand the invasion of the invisibles.
Yes, they knocked down quite a few of us during this past year. And still doing so with variants.
I, mr Lonely 2.0, can face this head-on, with 1st and 2nd jab.
With Moderna and modern medicines.
With new techniques of vaccine production, and new techniques for survival and thrive in the 21st century.
e.g. empathy, collaboration and enlarging the pie. Unlike in centuries past, when nations were in isolation.
Cold and hot wars. Mistrust and distrust. Partition and parallels (17th in my country’s case). This year marks the 50th anniversary of Ping Pong diplomacy (Chinese-made balls and paddles).
It’s OK who is making what, and who is paying for what.. Just stop the killing, the blaming and the dis-information.
We can collaborate in making a bigger pie, and prove Malthus wrong (Moore is right – the chips get smaller and the speed faster). Since 1948, every country seems to have gotten to its “next level” of progress and growth.
We will together do the right thing right. First thing first: getting out of our-selves, with imaged fear and associated delusion. Just turn on the music, put on a friendly face and sing….sing out loud…”to last our whole life long”…
Please, any song but Mr Lonely or Feelings….early 70’s soft- music were the worst. Unhealthy and uncalled for.
It always gets me down, on Rainy Days and Mondays….LOL
Thang Nguyen 555 